The Darkness has a new Wielder
by Shinku Ryuuga
Summary: Naruto finds himself about to grab a new summoning contract, but gets... something... much different instead. Let's watch how his life changes. -My response to MrWriterWriter's "What's in the Scroll" challenge. -Rated "T" until further notice.
1. It Begins

**Hello people of the internet! I am Shinku Ryuuga, as you can see by the blue words above this, and I am the author of this story. This is my response to MrWriterWriter's "What's in the Scroll" challenge, and my first try at a Naruto fanfic. Hopefully I don't do this too horribly, so, with a request of read and review, my story. I hope you enjoy.**

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><p>Sighing, the boy walked along the hall, knowing that he needn't worry about any ANBU at the moment. Considering how many times he'd spent in this Tower, the blond boy would've been surprised if he didn't have the shift change times memorized. It took away from the challenge of finding the Hokage's personal library, though… even though he'd spent quite a few nights holed up in there before being given the apartment, but it had been awhile, so the building layout might have changed, right? Well…<p>

"Door's in the same place, is it the same lock… yes, yes it is. Maaaan, Mizuki-sensei said it'd be hard as hell to break in here. Was he pulling my chain or something?" he grumbled, picking the lock expertly. It came with years of practice getting in that allowed him to grumble and not have to focus on the door. After all, the old Hokage couldn't give the only key to the library to a boy, but being given permission to sleep there at certain times had definitely kept him from getting hurt a lot.

Two taps here, five taps there… and one tap over here, of course. "Click" went the lock, as he removed the lock-pick from the keyhole. Opening the door, Uzumaki Naruto walked inside, not closing it behind him because he knew that, just as the ANBU changing of the guard was occurring right now(and rather slowly at that, were they out drinking again?), that Old Man Hokage wouldn't be in the Tower until tomorrow morning, though there was something nagging at the back of his head that Naruto couldn't quite push away…

"Naruto-kun? What are you doing here so late at night? Your home hasn't been ransacked again, has it?"

The familiar voice coming out of nowhere made him almost jump out of the "kill me" orange jumpsuit he wore, along with his sandals and goggles. Or that's what he felt like, at least, considering he only jumped about five inches off the ground. Turning to the old man, Naruto put on a goofy grin, one he knew usually disarmed the man that shouldn't be here. "Nah, but I missed this place, nothing beats the smell of books and scrolls, right?" The forced cheeriness was so commonplace that neither of the two males in the room would be able to say if it were actually fake or not.

Tilting his head inquisitively, Sarutobi Hiruzen didn't quite buy it. After all, Naruto had made his displeasure of the musty aroma quite clear at the age of ten. Raising an eyebrow at the now thirteen year old boy, the old Hokage asked him, "Really? Then why did I hear you say something about breaking in while you were picking the lock?"

That made Naruto pause, though anyone that didn't know him like the Hokage, and two others in the Village Hidden in the Leaves, wouldn't say he missed a beat. The forced smile drooped slightly as well, further alerting Hiruzen to the fact that something was up, though it wasn't just the search for his pipe.

"Oh, that? Well, uh, ya see, I, uh… Oiroke no Jutsu!" One handseal and a poof of smoke later the blond boy became a blonde bombshell, with wisps of smoke barely covering the indecent exposure the Sarutobi was subjected to shortly after the words came out of the boy's mouth.

"…Wow, and here I thought the Old Man was better than that. Oh well, makes my job easier." Naruto said as he scratched his head, then shrugged as he turned from the fallen Hokage, blood dripping from the old man's noise in a stream. Finding the "Forbidden Scroll of Sealing", as Mizuki-sensei said it was called, was rather simple, considering it was the biggest scroll in the library, though there were a few posters that came close to it's size… in the same bin, no less. "Ooookay… this looks more like a bargain bin than a container for some kind of scroll of forbidden jutsu." Naruto was unsure as to why that was, but after taking a quick peak at the rolled up posters, and finding them to have hot women on them, gave them no second glance.

…He would probably come back for them sometime later, though, they'd probably be much better help at perfecting his Sexy Technique than those civilian porn mags had been. Most of the women in those had nice bodies, but some of the faces… Naruto shuddered as he remembered them.

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><p>Landing near a small, very shabby shack, Naruto looked around to make sure he hadn't been followed. The clearing he was in the middle of provided ample view of the surrounding forest, after all, so it never hurt to look. After approving of the situation, he sat down and took the giant scroll off his back.<p>

"Man, this thing is heavy! If this is all just ONE sheet of paper, I'm a demon raccoon bent on destroying the village."

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><p><strong>"Achoo!"<strong>

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><p>Rolling the giant scroll open, Naruto saw that the first two jutsu available were variations of his worst technique. "Shadow Clone and Shuriken-slash-Kunai Shadow Clone… What else is in here?"<p>

Naruto rolled the scroll open further, finding that passed the first two jutsu, there were seals and more jutsu interspersed along the length of it. As well as minuscule stitches in the paper, telling Naruto that it wasn't all just one sheet.

"Let's see, there's this Dead Demon Consuming Seal, probably a goo-give my soul to the Shinigami? Pass. 'Dragon egg'… hmmm, I think I'll come back to that. Soul Eater, does that mean me or my opponent? Come back to that… hello, what's this? 'Black Dragon Technique', chakra intensive, burns just about anything in it's path, slowly destroys my arm with each use? Pass. 'Fire Dragon Flame Bomb', made by Old Man Hokage, chakra intensive, more powerful than the average Fire jutsu, hmm…" Naruto took out one of the small scrolls he packed into his jacket's inner pockets in case he came across a jutsu he liked but probably didn't have time to learn, along with a pen. After writing down the handseals for the Karyu Endan and labeling the line for it, Naruto went back to reading through the Forbidden Scroll.

"Dagger with alien technology on it, pass. I don't need a dagger, a sw-oohhh, red spear supposedly made of solid fire… Maybe. Hmm, sword made out of lightning gives me the same vibe as the spear, so I'll get back to that later.

"And next is… The Flying Thunder God Technique? The one the Fourth Hokage used? …Yup, very same one. Oh, dammit, it's not written down all the way, and I can't make these kunai by myself, let alone put the right seals on them… dammit. Well, what's next… summoning contracts? I like the sound of… dog, cats, birds, lizards, and, are they kidding me with this? F**king SPIRITS? I do believe we have a winner!" With that, Naruto brought his hand up, and after channeling some chakra into it, brought it down on-

"Naruto! What the hell do you think you're doing?"

-a poof was heard.

Naruto fell over as he heard the second familiar voice of the night, and it sounded rather angry. Sadly for him, his hand had changed directions upon hearing Iruka-sensei's yell, and instead of the spot where the kanji for "Spirit" was, his hand landed on the spot with "Soul Eater" written on it. The ensuing puff of smoke was actually something that worked in his favor.

The sound of weapons slicing the air was faint in Iruka's ears, but his instincts said jump, his body asked where to, so Iruka jumped to his right, evading the kunai that embedded themselves on the wall of the shack. No one heard the squeak that came from inside it.

Iruka turned to see that a certain white haired Chunin had landed on the branch that Iruka himself had jumped down from. "Mizuki, what is the meaning of this? Have you gone mad?" the tanned, scarred Chunin asked of his comrade.

Laughter was his answer. "Oh no, Iruka, I'm still quite sane, though the meaning of what's going on tonight will not be of any use to you, considering that you, and that stupid brat, are both going to DIE!" With that, Mizuki threw a bracer of shuriken at Iruka. Luckily for him, he managed to evade them. Unluckily for Naruto, Iruka had been right in front of him, though the puff of smoke was still lingering over his torso.

Upon hearing the clanging of metal hitting metal, Iruka wondered how Naruto deflected the shuriken while on his front, turning his head towards the boy, but after the smoke was swept away by a hand, found it wasn't Naruto that had deflected them, but a girl that looked rather pale in the moonlight. Iruka didn't pay attention to much else because the next thing he, and Mizuki, noticed about the girl was that she had a sword for an arm. A black, bat winged blade that started at her elbow.

Glaring at the white haired man, the girl growled at him, "Do you dare try to harm MY wielder, idiot? Do you not know what I am?" Both Chunin in the area could say they were freaked out by the way the girl's voice seemed to overlap with another, but they couldn't tell if the second voice was male or female.

Though if there was one thing Mizuki detested more than having to deal with anything related to the Ninja Academy, it's having to deal with anything related to that damnable fox brat! "Your wielder? If you want that piece of trash to own you, your standards must be rather low. He IS a demon, you know that, right?"

Iruka quickly turned to give Mizuki the darkest glare he could muster, though it would rank much lower on the "killing looks" scale than what the girl with a sword for an arm was still giving Mizuki. "He's not a demon, Mizuki! And if you tried getting to know him, you'd kno-"

Maniac laughter interrupted him. "Oh, oh dear gods, do you actually know what you're saying, Iruka? You're actually trying to stand up for the killer demon fox that killed just about half of Konoha's shinobi forces, YOUR parents among them?" Mizuki's continuing laughter made him ignorant of the dark look Iruka was giving the, now traitorous, Chunin. "Ahhh, it's been awhile since I could laugh like that. Well! Say goodbye, Iru-kaaaah!"

Iruka blinked as he saw the girl with a sword for a forearm interrupt Mizuki with a well placed stab. To make sure the man didn't do anything further, the girl slashed her arm upwards, splitting Mizuki's head, and the upper part of his torso, in two. Iruka wasn't sure if he was under a genjutsu or not, though, when he saw what happened next. Because, instead of slumping over, Mizuki's corpse turned into a ball of light that was almost covered in dark splotches, with very few patches of light shining through. Grabbing the ball from the air in which it hung, the girl brought it to her mouth and ate it whole, grimacing as she did so and looking like she wanted to hold her nose while eating the ball.

"Ugh, what a horrid tasting soul. I haven't had something this bad since the Heartless, they at least came in packs big enough to mix flavors." she said, turning to Naruto and ignoring Iruka's gaping maw and wide-eyed stare. Walking to the blond boy, the girl's arm shifted under Iruka's gaze, becoming flesh and blood instead of a black blade. The girl kneeled before Naruto, and Iruka almost dashed to knock the girl away from him when her hand reached out. Instead of strangling him, as he'd thought, she shook Naruto's shoulders, and spoke with a surprising gentleness as she did so. "Wake up, wielder, you must return to your housing. It would not do to catch cold out here."

A muffled voice came from Naruto's head's region, mumbling a few words that Iruka couldn't make out. The girl rose a thin eyebrow, and said, as if she had heard him perfectly, "The idiot is dead, you know. I think he was a traitor as well. After all, comrades don't go around throwing shuriken at each other with intent to kill."

Turning his head to face her knees, Naruto frowned. "I know that, but he sai-crap! I still need to learn a jutsu from the scroll!" Naruto got back onto his knees, and began looking for a jutsu to learn frantically, before what the girl said clicked in his head. "Wait, traitor? That means... he tricked me... Dammit! I'm better than that!" Naruto punched the ground to his left.

"Naruto? What do you mean Mizuki tricked you?" Iruka's presence was re-acknowledged by Naruto snapping his head to face the scarred Chunin with a shocked face. "While trying to kill a fellow Konoha shinobi is grounds for treason, if Mizuki is the one that set this whole thing up, I'll be able to make it so you go scot free, Naruto. Just tell me what he did, and I'll tell the Hokage." Iruka's serious face assured Naruto that the man wasn't going to go back on his word.

"That won't be necessary, Iruka-kun. I saw everything." The aged voice surprised two out of three people in the clearing. As the old Hokage landed from the clearing, coming down on the opposite side than Iruka and Mizuki had, he scanned the new face for any signs of trouble. Finding none, Sarutobi nodded and cleared his throat, still disliking the damage old age and who knows how many jutsu had done to it. "While I don't know why Mizuki had Naruto steal the Scroll, it was probably for some reason we don't want to know. Right now, though, I'd like you," he pointed at the girl, "to tell me your name."

Cocking her head to side, as if considering the demand, the girl said, "Well, normally I'm only in my weapon state, so I only went by Soul Eater at any given time. My last wielder, however, had a form that I felt would be better as a female body, so I'll take his name." Naruto took the time to look at her up and down. She had spiky silver hair that fell to just below her neck in back, and just above her small nose in front, partially obscuring her emerald green eyes. Under the moonlight, she'd looked like a ghost, but out of it, Naruto could tell she was supposed to be tan, though he wondered why she looked more like a recluse with her skin color. An open white vest and black tanktop were on her torso, though Naruto noticed that her tanktop was higher than it probably would have been normally, considering her breasts were big enough for a handful, at least, exposing her stomach to everyone's gaze. Moving his eyes downwards, Naruto found she was wearing light blue jeans, with two rather large pockets at the top. Aside from that, the pants were unremarkable. The girl's feet were covered by a pair of white and silver running shoes. Bringing his eyes back up to her face, Naruto waited with the others as the girl tried to remember her previous wielder's name. Though the males present wondered how a guy's name would work for a girl.

Snapping her fingers after a couple more minutes of thinking, she said, "Call me Riku." That answered their internal question handily.


	2. Explanations? Oh great

**Welcome to the second chapter, peoples. I'd like to thank everyone who read this for taking the time out of their day to do so, and a bigger thank you to everyone who reviewed and favorited/alerted this story.**

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><p>Naruto paced in front of the doors leading into the Hokage's office. Rather, leading out, considering the blond boy was inside said office, and he could not sit still for longer than thirty minutes, something Iruka could attest to. The reason why Naruto was pacing was because that thirty minute mark had been passed one and a half hours ago.<p>

Taking his pipe from his mouth, the old Third Hokage regarded the girl in front, who called herself Riku, with a critical gaze. "And you honestly wish me to believe you've been all over the world, since before the shinobi villages were first founded, since the time of the Rikudou Sennin? If it weren't for the fact that you showed you can turn your body into an actual weapon, I wouldn't even believe that. But please, tell me again how this 'war' of yours ended, would you?" Hiruzen asked of the girl, wanting to make sure he had this… rather elaborate fantasy right.

Sighing, Riku adjusted herself in the chair, getting ready for recounting the events which led her to be on this backwater world for a second time. That is, until Naruto walked up next to her and said, "Jiji, we already heard it once! She's had three wielders, two of which were evil, and the last one sacrificed himself taking out some big threat to him and his friends along with some guy called Sora, and she ended up in Konoha because of some giant explosion that sent her here from… where again? You lost me at that part." Naruto turned to Riku, confusion on his face as he absorbed what he had heard before getting up to pace and think of ways to get this whole thing over with.

Riku raised a thin, silver eyebrow at the boy's straightforward account of what he had heard, and how he addressed the old man that was apparently the leader of this village, which looked more like a city to her. "Destiny Islands was the final battleground between my previous wielder, his friend Sora, and their enemy, a man named Xehanort. Sora was wielding a weapon called the _X_-Blade, and the original Riku was wielding me, though I went by the name Void Gear at the time. Those two were the last ones alive to fight Xehanort, who'd been able to steal the _X_-Blade long enough to summon, and draw power from, Kingdom Hearts.

"It took everything they had, but Sora eventually drew power from Kingdom Hearts himself, exceeding Xehanort in power because Sora was wielding the _X_-Blade uninterrupted. Even though Xehanort still outclassed Riku, by teaming up with Sora, they were able to make Xehanort pull out his trump card, which killed all three of them, and sent me through the Space Inbetween, where I eventually landed on this world, weakened into Soul Eater, and I was found by a man that positively stank of Darkness, but since I didn't want to be wielded by him, I escaped from his armory as soon as I could, which was also the first time I took this form.

"A couple months after that, I'd fainted, and apparently reverted to my weapon form, because the last thing I remember before tonight was being on a piece of paper, with some guy in red armor pushing his hand on me. I blinked after that, and I was in Naruto's hand, though I could tell something was wrong when I shifted forms into this. Some throwing stars were coming towards him, so I blocked them, and the rest you all know." Riku finished her story, shorter though it was, and crossed her arms under her bust, awaiting the reaction to it.

Sarutobi nodded, having seen Mizuki's death in his crystal ball, and the coroner had told of a patch on Mizuki's shoulder that looked like a distorted skull, but was actually a recipe for a potion of some sort. The Third was unsure how it'd been put there, and while curious about it, dismissed it as unimportant, as it was a memento of a dead man. Though dead shinobi could tell many tales from their blood and skin, and various other bodily functions, those were deemed unimportant as they were dead ends as to how the traitorous Chunin got them. Turning back to the present, Hiruzen steepled his fingers in front of his face.

"Well, you being unable to remember near fifty years, at the least, while in a seal, tells me that time passes by instantaneously, though I'm curious as to how a human would feel in there. However, that's something to look at in the future, for now, I'm curious. Why did you say you went by the name Void Gear while fighting this 'Xehanort', but you are Soul Eater now?" The old man's voice let little of the suspicion he felt towards the odd young woman in front of him out, as her story had quite a few oddities he wanted to question her about, but, again, in the future.

Riku hummed to herself for a few seconds, in which Naruto tried to keep himself from falling asleep, since he'd yet to get his headband for 'defeating a nuke-nin', even though he hadn't done anything at all. He'd been told, on the way to the Tower, that he'd be listed as a 'battlefield promotion', though Iruka stated his displeasure at the fact that, after going through Naruto's file, he should have a headband already, since all of his previous quizzes and test records were labeled as, at the least, passing grade scores, but his previous teachers were of the opinion that Naruto was a demon, so they labeled him a failure any way they could.

Riku broke Naruto from his struggle as she spoke up again, her sharp voice cutting through his mind. "I'm a weapon that has had three forms, with Void Gear as my first, and most powerful form. That might have something to do with it being my true form, since my current form, Soul Eater, is my second and weakest form. I have a third form that's between Soul Eater and Void Gear in power, but I can't recall the name, or a lot of stuff from before I changed back into Soul Eater. All I know is that my previous wielder was named Riku and he looked similar to this, the last thing that doesn't escape me is the fight I talked about, and what happened when I came here." Finishing her explanation, Riku uncrossed her arms, and laid them on the armrests on her chair.

Naruto yawned, and broached the question he'd been holding back all night. "Hey, old man, can I have my headband now? It's getting late, and I don't want to be late for breakfast at Ichiraku." Naruto's sleepy face almost made Riku and Iruka yawn when they saw it, but Hiruzen just chuckled at the blond boy, and brought out a seemingly new headband from his sleeve. Though Iruka found it surprising that it was black, and longer than usual, though the metal with the Hidden Leaf on it was still equidistant from the ends. The scarred man wasn't sure if Naruto would notice that until he was fully awake, but Iruka noticed something else after he blinked. The headband was not in peak condition, with dirt caked onto it in certain places, and a few scratches in the metal, though Iruka's trained eye had trouble picking them out.

"This, my boy, is my old headband. It's seen much use, and I'm sure there're better you could have, but I think it's time I pass this on and see how well the newest generation of shinobi holds up." Hiruzen said as he held out the old headband to Naruto, who had lost his sleepy face as soon as the words "my old headband" passed the Hokage's lips. The blond started stuttering for a few seconds, before he settled on gaping at the old man.

His shock got a new friend called anger when Riku spoke up.

"No. I refuse to have my wielder be shackled to anything, or anyone." The fire in Riku's eyes told Iruka that it would be a hard fight to win her over, but Hiruzen saw that he had no chances in doing so.

"WHAT? I wouldn't be shackled if I became a ninja, I'd get to go to all kinds of places-"

"When you're told to! I REFUSE to have you locked up in here when there are much better places outside this village you can go!" Naruto gaped at Riku at those words, the silver haired girl glaring at Naruto for his defending a place she thought would waste his potential by keeping him locked in a cage of stagnation.

"Um, Riku-san, Naruto wouldn't be locked up here, there are still training grounds where he could train with you at an-" Iruka shut up after Riku's emerald glare turned to him. It was like looking into a gem that held in an inner fire, Iruka would later describe it, though at the moment, he just wanted those eyes off of him.

"They would be controlled environments with high chances of getting spied on, as Naruto can tell you from how many times he spied on some of the ninja while they were training." Naruto's hands were a second too late to quiet her mouth, and the damage was done. Iruka gaped at Naruto, though a nearby fly was quickly smacked to death before it got within ten inches of Iruka's mouth.

Hiruzen rose an eyebrow at that. "Naruto, how have you been spying on Konoha nin? That is disrespectful to them, and I expect you to apologize t-"

"HELL no I'm not apologizing!" Naruto exclaimed as he interrupted his grandfather figure, "Do you know how badly the academy teachers sabotaged me? Worse than what Iruka-sensei says, I can tell you that!" Hiruzen's other eyebrow joined it's brother on the old man's wrinkled forehead at that. "The taijutsu teacher tried to cripple me, multiple times, I might add, I had to buy the shoddiest equipment ever for weapons practice, and the tests I was given were probably Chunin level stuff!" Naruto removed his hands from Riku's mouth after she had licked the palm of his hand, the girl having looked at the hands for a couple minutes before remembering she could move. Wiping the saliva off his hand and on Riku's pants("Dammit, these are new!"), Naruto settled back into his chair, looking rather disgruntled at having to tell the Hokage his problems.

"...And you never came to me, or Iruka-kun, with this... why?" Naruto grunted at the old man's question, looking away and finding the wall to his right rather interesting all of a sudden.

"I figured... you guys didn't need to worry about me." The small voice Naruto used, along with mumbling, would have made it hard to make out what he said to normal people, but Iruka, Riku, and the old Hokage could hear him just fine, despite the latter's age, and that the second was new to the whole 'having a body' thing.

"Naruto-kun, if you'd come to me with this before today, you'd have gotten a proper education, not what those... 'people'... gave you." The way Hiruzen spat out the word 'people' told Iruka there would be some new teachers in the Konoha Ninja Academy soon.

Naruto shook his head at that, looking resigned. "Nah, it'd be the same no matter what. Iruka-sensei was the only one that treated me fairly, so there'd be no difference if the other teachers changed." The blond's eyes were dulled as he remembered being made to wait outside certain classes so he would fail tests and exams, having to buy shoddy equipment, not that anyone noticed, and having to make up his own way of protecting himself.

The next words Naruto heard replaced the dull, saddened eyes with bright, shocked, and happy ones. "Then I'll have to train you in more than swordsmanship, it seems." Confusion replaced shock when Riku was done speaking. "After all, my wielder isn't going to be called 'idiot' by anyone, if I can help it."

Iruka gave the sword-girl an inquisitive look. "How could you help him learn? You don't know anything about Konoha's history, or, really, anything about the elemental nations."

"So I'll just teach him math and etiquette. Geography can be learned on the road." Naruto looked just confused now. "Math so you'll be able to cou-"

"But you're, by your own admission, a sword! You can't teach him anything!" Riku glared at Iruka for interrupting her.

"I had a link with my previous wielder that allowed me to input information into his mind about how to wield me. It worked two ways, so I got information as he learned the finer details of my abilities." Iruka was about to open his mouth when Riku brought a hand up... and covered it in white fire. "THIS, for example, is one of the magic spells I can teach my wielders, along with a few others I picked up through my previous wielder's own ideas about how to use me in battle." The fire disappeared after Riku blinked. No smoke, no singed skin, not even a smell of fire lingered. The white fire just disappeared without a trace.

Naruto, understandably, was in awe of the fire. "Holy crap, that is so cool! And I can learn it from you? Along with other cool stuff? This is awesome! I'm going to be the best shinobi ever! Ow!" Riku brought her hand back to her lap as Naruto righted himself in his seat, having been bent forward from how hard Riku hit the back of his head. "What wazzat for?"

"You're NOT. Becoming. A shinobi. We've already gone over this." Naruto grumbled at that, while Hiruzen rubbed his chin.

"Riku-san, may I suggest a compromise?" Seeing the silverette turn her head towards him, the old monkey continued. "Perhaps Naruto could wield you and still be a shinobi of Konohagakure no Sato. After all, he would be going to different places all over the elemental nations while on missions. He wouldn't be shackled to this place because it's his home. Though, I don't think there're any spots left for him on teams at the moment, so he'd have to be on idle status. All that would mean is that he'd be restricted to missions in and around Konoha, until a team going out had a spot open for one reason or another. With that, you'd both be able to go outside Hi no Kuni, and learn the lay of the land. Is that acceptable, Riku-san?"

Riku hummed, closing her eyes in thought for a few seconds, while Iruka tried to get the words out of his mouth to ask why the Hokage was trying to bargain with a sword. Iruka didn't get the chance. "Alright, that's acceptable. But I have two conditions. One, Naruto gets a better home, and two, he and I reserve the right to decline missions." Naruto interjected with a question about why he'd want to decline a mission. "In case it's something we both know would be boring or stupid, like going out of the country, and we have to, I dunno... sit in at some guy's fake funeral or something."

That response got a few blinks out of the males present. Sarutobi rubbed his chin and wondered if he should put missions through a background check to make sure nothing like that happened in the future. "Do you have any preferences for a new home, Naruto-kun? After all, since you'll be living with Riku-san from now on, I figure you'll be needing to have some say in where you'll both be living."

Naruto blinked. "Uhm, why are you asking me that now? Last time you just gave me my key, directions, and said 'have fun'." Riku and Iruka turned glares onto Sarutobi, who started sweating a bit at the fact Naruto revealed one of the negligences against the boy. Hiruzen's experienced mind quickly gave him an out, but Naruto continued before he spoke. "But that's alright, I don't really care where I go, so long as it ain't the slums anymore."


	3. Moving and training

**Before the chapter starts, I want to tell those of you that know of Persona that a friend of mine, BrightRedNova, has started a story in that universe. "Dark Side of the Soul" he calls it. Currently, it's on it's third chapter, as of this writing. Number wise, at least. If Persona catches your interest, go check it out. It's not the best, but neither is this. That said, thank you all for taking the time out of your day to read this.**

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><p>Naruto yawned again as he walked down the sleeping streets of Konoha. It was close to the middle of spring, so he wasn't too worried about getting mugged by some opportunistic drunk.<p>

Having a Chunin walking alongside him might have helped that, along with the girl who can turn into a sword. Or was it sword into a girl? _"Meh, not like it's a big deal anyway. She has two forms, and that's that."_ Naruto twisted his body so he didn't crash into a nearby pole as his thoughts drifted to how he'd become the greatest ninja ever, stopping all wars and having enough family to start his own village.

Such dreams would never come to fruition, but it never hurts to have a goal, right?

"-ruto, are you sure your place is here? This isn't just the slums, this is the SLUMS. You definitely don't fit the criteria to be living here." Iruka's words brought Naruto back to the land of the living. Right before he crashed into a pole.

Riku sighed as Naruto rubbed his nose, and rubbed the bridge of her own. "Honestly, if you're going to be my wielder, you need to get your head on straight. I'm not going to tolerate walking into poles every ten minutes."

"Five, actually. The last one was before we got to this part of Konoha." Naruto gave Iruka a mini glare, but it looked more like a childish pouting. Iruka's joking smile made Naruto turn back towards the direction they'd originally been going with a huff.

"Come on, it's only a few more minutes from here." Naruto began walking again, while Riku surreptitiously glared towards the rooftop of a nearby building, the two males present not noticing this, nor the white fireball she spits at the rooftop.

The scream that was abruptly cut off by meeting the ground did get their notice.

"What the hell?"

Naruto's oh so eloquent question of what happened to make a burning body appear in front of him earned a smack to the back of his head with Iruka berating him for his "Language!"

Grumbling as he rubbed the second sore spot on his head, Naruto turned to Riku. "What'd you do?"

Crossing her arms under her chest, Riku glared at the burning corpse, the white flames seeming to burn brighter and faster at the action. "That guy was oozing darkness and killing intent. I'm not going to let my wielder, or his teacher, get killed because I was lax at my job of being his sword. Even if that means preempting things."

Naruto blinked and turned back to the corpse, now ashen black without the white flames on it. He'd also felt the killing intent, but hadn't thought it'd mean anything. Iruka had a different approach. "What are you talking about? There's no way he was 'oozing' killing intent, I'd've sensed it! And what do you mean about darkness?"

Riku turned an impassive stare onto Iruka. "Can we get to Naruto's old place first? I'd rather not have to deal with eavesdroppers if I don't have to." Naruto seconded the idea, and the group began walking again.

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><p>Naruto sighed as he sat on his old couch for probably the last time. He wouldn't miss it, considering it was old, holey, and springs poked at his bum if he sat too long. "So, what were you talking about with darkness intent and killing?"<p>

"Killing intent and darkness, Naruto. Killing intent is what a person gives off when they're, to put it bluntly, sufficiently pissed off enough to give an aura that tells people 'I'm going to kill this guy.' Usually, since I've also seen it used without the person exuding it wanting to actually kill someone." Riku absently scratched her cheek as Naruto and Iruka paid attention to her speech, the scarred Chunin leaning against a wall and the sword-girl sitting at the only chair in the place. "Darkness has a few sides to it, but there's generally one consensus among people not in the know, that being that darkness is evil. Darkness itself is inherently neutral, in actuality. It's just horrible coincidence that most of the beings that use it are evil, however, like my previous wielder, there are a few that can take Darkness and make it their bitch, while fighting for the good side." _"And I also had the misfortune of my first wielder being an evil sonovabitch. At least he got his comeuppance."_ Iruka missed the flash of anger in Riku's eyes, but Naruto caught it and the sorrow before she forced calmness back into her expression.

The few seconds of silence also let Iruka take in what was said. "Language, Riku-san! There's no need to cuss." Naruto snickered at Iruka scolding the girl, who shrugged it off.

"Anyway, where was I? Ah, yes, some people can make Darkness their bitch, but it's just as possible for Darkness to consume people. It's how most of the major threats to the Worlds come about, since Darkness tends to make people act a leeeetle bit crazier than usual. Or in the case of, say, Naruto here, it'd make him act like a jerkass that pranked everyone for whatever reason he could come up with." Naruto's eyes widened at that, as he'd only pranked people because they deserved either payback, or some humor in their life(those stupid Hyuugas were still stuck up pricks, though, so that was a failure). "At least, until the Darkness consumes him, in which case, Naruto would become one of the most powerful humans on this World, though he'd lose a part of him that would make Naruto, Naruto. Unless he took control of the Darkness inside, which would still make him more powerful, but Naruto wouldn't need to worry about being consumed. He'd also probably be less powerful than if he had been consumed by Darkness." Iruka and Naruto were both wide eyed at Riku's hypothetic scenarios, and were wondering if there were some way he could help, or learn to control it, respectively.

As Riku took a breath, Naruto raised his hand. "Uhm, what about light? You've talked so much about darkness, so isn't light something we can use, too?" Riku smiled at Naruto and nodded.

"That's right. I probably should've started with this, but no matter. A person's Heart, and I don't mean the one that pumps blood, but the crystalline Heart that makes up a person's soul, is made up of Light and Darkness. This is untrue in only nine known cases, two of which weren't natural. However, since I, and by extension Naruto, am only able to wield Darkness, there's not much to worry about when it comes to Light. I think that's enough for one early morning, don't you?" Iruka looked to the window and noted the sun's rays were peaking out from the horizon.

"I'm sorry Naruto, we've kept you up all night talking!" Iruka turned towards his student, and found the blond asleep on the couch, head lying backwards in a position that would surely leave him sore if he woke up like that. Iruka turned to Riku. "You must be tired as well, since you've done most of the talking. I'll get Naruto into his bed and see if he has any spare blankets." With that, Iruka walked over to the blond boy and hoisted him into his arms, walking to Naruto's bedroom soon after. After tucking Naruto in, Iruka went through his closet, noting that there was quite a bit of space in it, with only a couple copies of Naruto's jumpsuit in it. Coming back to the living room, Iruka was about to apologize to Riku, when he saw Soul Eater leaning against a wall, green ball empty. Shrugging to himself, Iruka left Naruto's apartment to go back to his own, ready for some sleep himself.

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><p>Naruto yawned as he woke up and sat in his bed. Scratching his head, Naruto looked towards the door connecting his room to the living room, and saw a sword that told him last night hadn't been a dream. The grassy stains on the jumpsuit, and bed, told Naruto the rest. <em>"Whoa... so, I am moving today? Sweet! No more having to deal with cockroaches every other day! No more not having hot water! And no more bed breaking on me!"<em> "WOOHOO!"

Naruto's outburst caused the black sword outside his room to shudder, and the slit that made the green ball an eye appeared slowly, as if sleepily, and blinked a couple times. With a flash of light, Riku appeared again, rubbing the sleep from her eyes. Yawning, she turned to Naruto. "What're you so happy about in the morning? Don't you know it's... huh, it looks like it's almost noon." Naruto looked outside his window, and saw the the sun was rather high in the sky.

"Oh crap, Jiji might not have time anymore! Come on Riku, we gotta go!" With that, Naruto bolted out of his bed and grabbed Riku's hand, pulling the girl along with him as he slammed the door behind him. The key he'd been given so long ago had been lost, and no one else lived in this apartment complex either, so Naruto never bothered with locking the door behind him going out. Taking to the roofs to keep from being sneered and glared at by those very few stupid civilians, Naruto almost didn't notice Riku transform into Soul Eater to make travel easier on the both of them.

The sudden voice in his head is what made him notice. _"Wow this place is empty. I don't think I've seen a mind as empty as this since my previous wielder's friend's early days. He was quite the airhead back then."_ Naruto glanced at Soul Eater in his right hand, and was liking what he saw. _"Oho? Do you like me like this more than as a human?"_ Naruto stuttered and stumbled at that, and was glad he wasn't at the edge of a rooftop, considering he fell flat on his face. Laughter filled his mind as he got back up. _"I'm just pulling your leg, Naruto, you don't need to answer that."_

Naruto dusted himself off as he stood, and started jumping again towards the Hokage tower. He was curious about something now, but he couldn't quite place it. Shrugging and letting it slip into the back of his mind, Naruto jumped down from the rooftop next to the wall surrounding the Hokage tower, and began walking in. The ANBU guarding the entrance waved to Naruto, and the boy waved back to his superiors. Being on good terms with most of the ANBU was nice, since it meant they didn't try too hard to catch him during an after prank chase. Not as hard as Iruka, at least. If any of the ANBU felt like, they could catch him on one of his better days. Naruto knew this, and had known this since the tenth prank he pulled.

Which was also the first of five pranks he'd played on the Hyuga. Those guys needed to get those sticks out of their rear ends, if you asked him. _"Agreed. From what I can see, now that you're thinking of them, the only one that looks remotely pleasant is that Hinata girl. ...wait, you thi-wow, you're more of an airhead than I thought."_ Naruto almost asked what Riku meant by that, but turned his attention to the secretary that cleared her throat at him. Jiji had always had nice secretaries, except that one lady that glared at... everyone, come to think of it. At Naruto, at Sarutobi, at ANBU, and just about everyone else that walked by her desk. She'd gotten replaced by the current one in a week.

Turning to wave at the secretary, Naruto saw her eyes were locked on something in the general direction of... "Oh, this isn't an assassination attempt, Takeba-san. I just forgot to ask her to change back when we got here." The brunette secretary raised an eyebrow and opened her mouth to ask why Naruto said her, when a flash of light came from the black sword in Naruto's hand, and Riku stood next to him. She blinked, and nodded at Naruto.

"You can go in now, Uzumaki-kun. He's been expecting you and your friend for a bit now." Rubbing the back of his head at that, Naruto gave a sheepish smile and walked in, Riku giving a light bow to the secretary before following the blond in. Looking up at the sound of the door opening, Sarutobi nodded in greeting to Naruto and Riku. The boy grinned as he waved to Hiruzen, and then noticed the other occupant of the room.

"This is my new tenant? You should've said so earlier, Hokage-sama!" Naruto readied himself to getting a hateful look from the redhaired woman sitting on the couch up against the wall. He was surprised that the frustrated tone and look was sent to Hokage-jiji instead of him. "Of course he's welcome to my penthouse!" Naruto blinked.

"Penthouse? Why do I not like the sound of that?" Riku chuckled at his question, and pushed Naruto towards one of the chairs in front of the Hokage's desk, sitting next to the redhead herself. As Naruto seated himself, he gave Hiruzen a confused look.

Chuckling himself, Hiruzen waved his hand. "Its just the name given to the top level of buildings, and generally also the most expensive. Kirijo-san, however, wants to give you a discount for taking up the shinobi occupation." The redhead nodded, and Naruto turned to look at her. Like Takeba-san outside, she was rather pretty, though instead of having her hair straightened back, Kirijo-san had waves going back to just above her waist, and one weird curl just in front of her left shoulder.

'Noble' was the word that came to mind as Kirijo-san opened her mouth, now sounding calm instead of frustrated. "I give all my shinobi occupants discounts on living in my apartment complexes, though they have stricter rules than the civilian occupants, and the discount also varies by rank. For instance, since you're my first Genin occupant in a few years, Uzumaki-kun, you'll have a higher discount than the other shinobi occupants. But since you'll also be in the penthouse, that means you'll be paying the same amount as a Chunin in a normal apartment." Riku looked curious as to why that was, and Naruto voiced his own question about it. Sarutobi answered him.

"Kirijo-san's apartment complex runs on a different set of rules than most, as her penthouse only costs twice as much as the normal apartments, instead of up to five times. And, her clan has been one of the main suppliers of arms, equipment, and general supplies for Konohagakure no Sato for as long as it's been around. They're also the second best blacksmiths we have in the village." Sarutobi and Riku ignored Kirijo-san's mumbling about being the best if they could buy that one business. "As such, there's very little the current head of the Kirijo Group cannot do. She also happens to moonlight as a landlady every couple weeks."

Naruto's wide eyed stare at Sarutobi made the old monkey chuckle. After going through the contracts and documents needed, with a few signatures here and there, Naruto shook hands with Kirijo Mitsuru and watched the curvy woman leave. Sarutobi could've sworn he saw her hips swaying, though Naruto missed that fact and Riku was napping. After getting all that paperwork done, Naruto's grin turned to Sarutobi. "This is one of the best days I've ever had, Jiji. Thanks a bunch!" The old man waved off Naruto's gratitude with a small smile of his own. He was undeserving of it.

After Naruto woke up Riku and explaining their next activity for the day, Soul Eater was in his hand as he jumped out the window, Sarutobi almost yelling out the name of a man that wasn't there. Upon reaching a secluded training ground, Riku appeared again, and moved to stand opposite Naruto. "Alright, since we're training, I'm going to go easy on you, but first, the method of training today," she raised her hand and engulfed it in white flames, "is dodging. Going through your memories as we came here, I noticed that you tended to block more than dodge, and that could get you killed, at worst. So, we're going to work on your speed and reaction time. Any questions before we start?" Naruto nodded and gulped.

Riku blinked. "Oh, this is called 'Dark Fire'. At the moment, I can only launch one at a time, since I'm rather rusty from about eighty years of unuse, but this should help us both. Now, I suggest you move... now!" With that, training began.

* * *

><p>Naruto panted as he rested against a tree, looking at the sword next to him with frustration and shock. "The heck was that? The entire area went dark, and I couldn't control myself, and now, half the trees around here are cut to pieces!" Grasping the hilt of the batwinged sword, Naruto listened to the explanation given. "Okay, too much chakra channeled at one time, but you said just a bit and I could move faster! Not get teleported around a bunch of times!" Naruto's eyes widened as he listened again. "The heck do you mean that could have gone longer if I didn't stab the ground? How much lo-...you're kidding, right?"<p>

Riku appeared next to Naruto, panting herself from the exertion and exhilaration using Dark Aura again caused her. "No, I'm not. If you hadn't released the chakra through me into the ground and into those lightning bolts, we'd still be doing that from now to tomorrow night. The holes in the ground we made are testament to that, since those were far more powerful than anything I've done before." Riku shook her head as she tried to calm her breathing. "If we'd had something to practice on, it'd probably be ash right now."

Naruto was hoping she was exaggerating that. Riku was hoping he'd listen.

* * *

><p><strong>Okay, so not a lot of training, but I'm sure that'll come to me later. And would the people that read this mind telling me if this is bad or not? Because I'd like some criticism. It'd tell me if I'm doing anything wrong or something.<strong>


	4. More talking! Oh dear Kamisama

**Sorry about the long wait, readers. I'll try not to make you all wait so long next time, but no promises or guarantees. And please, review! I want to know if I'm doing something good, or bad, or anything! Just alerts and favorites isn't telling me how bad a writer I am.**

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><p>Naruto whistled a little tune to himself as he walked to his favorite place in Konoha, bar the Hokage Tower or Monument, Ichiraku Noodle Shop. Riku walked beside him and contemplated something she hadn't noticed till now. Naruto's heart had about the largest natural amount of Light she'd seen in any male, with only that sliver of Darkness that allowed Naruto to have a personality of his own, but there was a red dot in the Darkness for some reason. Riku had felt a third mind when she was Soul Eater and in Naruto's hand, but hadn't pay it any mind before now. Perhaps it was time she explained how to sense Darkness and what little of it Naruto smelled like.<p>

After they were out of the public eye, that is. Riku didn't want Naruto to start freaking out about what they were going to be talking about in plain sight, so Riku and Naruto ate their noodles in silence. Well, Riku ate, Naruto slurped. Let it not be said that Naruto spilled, though, since Riku managed to walk out without having to change into Soul Eater and back to clean herself. On the way to their new home, Naruto patted his stomach, content with the amount of noodles he'd eaten.

And then a finger poked his shoulder from behind. Looking over his shoulder, Naruto saw a familiar face from his class at the Ninja Academy. "Tenten-chan? What're you doing here?" Turning fully to face her, Naruto saw she'd gotten some new clothes that seemed to accentuate her growing figure. She wasn't an hourglass, yet, but Naruto's puberty stricken mind imagined her grown figure easily.

And then his mind came back when he noticed she'd been talking for a couple seconds. "-alked on a roof?" Naruto nodded his agreement almost instantly, taking a second to think of the words that took place before she finished her question. He wondered what she wanted to keep out of civilian ears, but turned to Riku first.

"Wait here, I should only be gone for a few minutes." After seeing her nod, Naruto jumped up to the nearest rooftop, Tenten following him after a second of airtime. "So, what is it you wanted to talk about?" Naruto turned to face the bun-haired girl again as he asked, seeing her face turn from a forced calm to worry. "Is something wrong?"

Tenten chewed on her lip for a few seconds, before blurting out, at a speed faster than the text would have you think, "Do you know why Mizuki wanted to kill you last night?" Naruto, being a fast talker himself, managed to catch and translate the quicker than normal speech. He didn't even need to think about his response.

"Nope. Don't really care, either, since he was probably a lunatic, too. He tried to kill me and Iruka-sensei, s-wait, how do you know Mizuki tried to kill me? I'm pretty sure Hokage-jiji hasn't told anyone about it, and I know Iruka-sensei and I haven't." Naruto crossed his arms and gave Tenten an out of place serious look, causing the girl to scratch the back of her head sheepishly.

"I sometimes stay out too late training and didn't want my dad to yell at me for coming home after the shop's closed, so I found that shack one day after moving to a new training ground for some self study, and I use it to sleep in some times. I had the luck to be sleeping when something impacted the outer wall, which woke me up, and I saw everything from there." Tenten paused here, unsure if even a roof was safe from eavesdroppers for this part of the conversation. Naruto took the pause differently.

"So you saw Riku's arm when she killed Mizuki?" Tenten winced at the memory, answering Naruto's question handily. "Right, taking you to Hokage-jiji." With that Naruto said to Riku, "Going back to the Tower, meet us there." Before turning back to Tenten and feeling a little bad at himself from the face she was making. It was a mix between saddened and horrified that probably wouldn't be out of place on a falsely accused witness being called the murderer. Though Naruto's thoughts probably exaggerated that from her slumped posture, he couldn't help but feel bad for her. At least no ANBU were around to hear, that would've sucked horribly for both of them. Deciding to try and better her mood, Naruto scratched the back of his head as he started thinking of a way to do so.

"It's not like I don't trust you not to tell anyone, Tenten-chan, it's just that I think Hokage-jiji wouldn't want to let it be known that someone unaccounted for was there." After getting a nod from Tenten, looking a lot less scared of getting executed for a treason she didn't willingly or knowingly commit, the two began jumping towards the Hokage Tower, passing Riku overhead, as she was going at a more leisurely pace than the situation would be called for if she were a member of Konoha's military force. This did give her time to think of how to tell Naruto how to increase the darkness inside him without it sounding like she were trying to convert him into some evil cult.

_"First off, there's the fact that he's barely got enough darkness inside him to let him wield me without burning either of us, so there is that. Though, come to think of it, anyone else probably WOULD be burned with that amount of darkness. Maybe it's that red dot that's making him not burn? I know I haven't felt anything adverse, so I'm not in any danger, yet."_ Riku rubbed her chin before looking at her hands. Finding they were burn free, she noted to herself to check her legs later. _"Though I wonder how long it'll take him to be able to use _his_ skills. Probably a month or two, unless I can corru-_TEACH_ Naruto how to act as a 'Not Evil Darkness User'_**(TM)**, _but how? Riku wasn't exactly the most sociable guy around, and he was a major playboy. I don't think Naruto is going to act like that at all. He seems more like the type to stumble into a relationship, and do his best to keep it. Whether it advances or not is up to chance."_ Riku chuckled a bit at her description of Naruto's eventual lovelife. She didn't know when or who, but Riku was fairly certain Naruto would be a curveball in anyone's lovelife, whether they wanted him or not. That much she could tell from just sifting through his memories as she was held earlier today.


	5. Assignments

**Oh dear lord, I'm so sorry for this taking so long! And for the shortness of chapter four, I don't know why I posted that when it was so short. Also, there has been a six day timeskip between last chapter, and when this one properly starts at.**

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><p><em>Slashing down through yet another stupid ronin, he sighed. The little army sent against him seemed to be unending, considering it was only supposed to be a gathering of four hundred or so. Maybe taking this mission wasn't so smart?<em>

_Raising a hand, he enveloped the area in his domain of power, and in minutes, there were only a few men still living, as they'd been outside his range. Walking toward them, flipping the kunai in his hand by its ring, he wondered, why was it so bloody? It should've been a simple get in, get out, get home, get paid mission. But no, it wasn't. It hadn't been from the very start. Why should it have been? It was one of those "This doesn't go in the books at any time, Hokage-sama." mission, so that spoke very well of how bad the situationwas._

_Slashing his kunai out, he wondered why his powers were so weakened when his partner wasn't with him, logical though it was. She was his conduit, after all, so other weapons would weaken, break, like the ten or so kunai he'd gone through already. Another thought popped into his head after that…_

"Why am I so calm about this?"

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><p>Sighing, Naruto walked up to the Konoha Ninja Academy, wondering to himself how much mockery he'd get for walking in when he was supposed to have failed, his now familiar 'sword' on his back, in a scabbard so that he didn't get all sorts of weird or nasty looks for having such a 'demonic' sword out in the open, as he did earlier in the week when the odd civilian looked up to see who was jumping on the rooftops. Naruto chuckled to himself as Riku wondered in his head why he was reflecting on that odd tidbit instead of the fact that old man Hokage had put him in an already existing team.<p>

"_Eh, I don't think that really matters right now. Not like we're gonna be working with Sasuke-teme and Sakura, right? Or that stupid Kaka-baka. Dear Kami-sama above, I do NOT want to work with him and his perpetual lateness! And Sakura and her screeching at him about it? No thank you."_ Naruto shook his head at that really not wanting to deal with them. He didn't get into Sasuke because Riku had run into the duckhead earlier in the week, about a day or so after Tenten had gotten chewed out by Hokage-sama for not telling him she'd been there(not that he hadn't already known, what with his crystal ball and everything), and her impression of the boy?

"He needs that stick pulled out of his rear end, and have it shoved through his foot."

Naruto had laughed long and hard at that. Who knew Riku had such a nice sense of humor? Moving on, though...

Sliding the door to his soon to be former classroom open, Naruto waved to Iruka-sensei with a smile, it turning into a grin when his wave was returned. Heading to his old seat, Naruto looked around at the classmates there... and noticed he was rather early, since only Nara Shikamaru, Akimichi Choji, and Aburame Shino were there. Leaning back, feet on the back of the underside of his desk, Naruto decided to pull a Nara(it might as well be a trademark of that clan's), and went to sleep while waiting.

Shino, sitting in the upper right corner desk, window seat, wondered why Naruto had come to join the graduating students, as the Uzumaki boy was among those who had failed. However, as Naruto had not sat next to him or tried to engage in conversation from across the room, Shino merely adjusted his glasses, silently curious but deciding that it'd be better to not awaken Naruto. And Iruka-sensei hadn't contested it, so Shino felt no reason to either.

Choji was sleepily munching on a muffin next to Shikamaru as they sat a desk to Naruto's right, and a row down. Most Akimichis were morning people, to Shikamaru's surprise when he'd slept over one night, but Choji was among the rare examples of the few 'big-boned' ninja clan members that weren't operating at full capacity before their preferred morning snack. Choji's was muffins, with chips the rest of the day. Shikamaru had gotten used to waking up at the crack of his mother's frying pan on his headboard, which was also the crack of dawn, so while the Nara boy was used to waking up early and practically dragging Choji to the Ninja Academy, he, like most men of his clan, was not very fond of it.

The only reason Shikamaru hadn't questioned why Naruto was here was because it'd be too troublesome to turn his head from where it was perched, staring at the wall. He was pretty comfortable already, so why try changing position?

* * *

><p>As time wore on, and Iruka put the finishing touches on his prepared speech, along with reading one of his more recreational books(not with an orange cover), students filed into the classroom, all looking at Naruto questioningly when they got there, except one who looked rather happy at seeing him, but decided to just grab a seat and not try to wake up the blond. Things usually never went well when they tried to wake him from La La Land. Except for two of the girls in the class, and Shikamaru and Choji, everyone got a rather pranky reaction from Naruto, even Iruka, when he went up to shake Naruto's shoulder. An eraser to the head always cut off the boy's wake up pranks before they could start.<p>

All was well in the classroom. Shino was playing with a beetle he'd let in, Inuzuka Kiba and his ninken Akamaru were conversing in barks and growls, just about half the girls in the class were ogling resident 'heartthrob' and all around jerkass, Uchiha Sasuke, Hyuuga Hinata was blushing as she looked at Naruto's sleeping form, the redness of her cheeks flaring and dimming at odd intervals, and-why was the ground shaking?

The door slammed open, no one jumping in surprise at the common scene of Haruno Sakura and Yamanaka Ino, two of the recorded best kunoichi in class who were also usually the last to arrive without being late, tried forcing their way through the door at once. As it was a sliding door with two sides, the two girls ended up squishing against each other as they yelled, growled, and screamed at each other that they'd gotten there first, so they got to sit next to Sasuke-kun.

The rest of the girls in the room were very tempted to start yelling that no, they should be the one sitting next to Sasuke-kun if that were the case, but since they'd all centered around Sasuke, who was sitting next to Naruto, they didn't want to try waking up the blond boy and getting caught in the crossfire of his wake up pranks. As it was, Naruto just snored on through the doorway debacle. He'd actually been one of the few who were able to instantly incur the ire of Sakura, while Ino was a bit longer on the fuse.

After a few minutes of scrabbling to get the other off, and behind, her, the two girls popped out of the door and started running to where Sasuke usually sat... and found a yellow and orange obstacle in their path. Sakura's eyebrow ticked, and her rather large forehead gained a pulsing vain.

"NARUTO! WAKE UP! You're in my way!" she screeched, thinking he was just slumped over, which wasn't unusual, instead of asleep, as Naruto tended to move around a bit when he first fell asleep. The various students around her began making either cutting motions along their throats when Sakura started speaking, or shooing motions towards Ino to get away from the danger zone.

Unluckily for either, they didn't see these motions, so they got the full force of... cream pies getting launched in their faces? While the class in general was blinking and wondering where the heck Naruto got cream pies, there were three or four laughing at Sakura and Ino getting cream pie'd. Naruto yawned as he sat up, rubbing his eyes with the back of his hand. Looking around, Naruto blinked at seeing two creamed faces, the pie pans having fallen off by now.

"Huh. So that's why I got woken up." Naruto said to himself, as he reached down for the rather clean pie pans on the ground, and smirked to himself upon hearing a snickering in his head. _"You like, Riku?"_

_'Oh god, th-they look like they got... AAHAHAHAH!'_ the sword on his back projected, and Naruto could just see Riku's body rolling around in his head. No one noticed the light tremors the sword was making, as it was silenced by a few seals to make unsheathing it from Naruto's back easier and less likely to be heard.

Iruka rubbed his nose, smiling to himself before he waved his hand at Sakura and Ino, directing them to their seats, and quieting down the laughers with his other hand. With the class once more quiet, Iruka took up a piece of paper, and began reading the names off the list on it.

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><p>"...and Akimichi Chouji, Nara Shikamaru, and Yamanaka Ino will make up Team Ten." With that, Iruka slipped the paper back onto the clipboard on his podium, and looked up at the graduating class, opening his mouth to give a speech when a hand was raised.<p>

"Iruka-sensei, what about Naruto-baka? He shouldn't even be here!" one Inuzuka Kiba questioned, lowering his hand. Iruka chuckled at that as he looked at all the other curious faces, while the said Uzumaki himself was just fiddling with a pencil, trying to make it bend without breaking. Somehow, he was doing it, too. No one but Iruka and one other noticed, though, the other having been staring at Naruto since they first came into the room.

"Well, Naruto is actually a twenty-eighth candidate, so he would've been put in reserve for his scores, were they a bit better the first time we tested him. As it is, after his retesting, Hokage-sama has decided to put Naruto on an already existing team, still a reserve member, but he doesn't have to wait for someone to get injured in this case." Iruka explained to the class at large. "Now then, after lunch, your Jonin sensei will be here to pick you up. So shoo, I've got papers to work on." Iruka waved the graduating class out of his classroom, the bell ringing not a second after he started.

As would be expected, nobody had any qualms about running out the door. Naruto surprised a few of the people that waited for the exit rush to die down by not being part of the crowd, as he usually was. Yawning and stretching a bit, Naruto began walking out of the Academy, whistling a little tune to himself, and hearing Riku sing it in his head was somewhat amusing. _'If-a-if if ya try to duel me, it's gonna make me stronger...'_

_"Say, how do you know that song? I only heard it recently."_ Naruto thought to the sword on his back, hands in his pockets as he walked to his favorite ramen stand in the whole village.

_'Simple. I can read your mind like this. That's also how I can communicate with you at all. Which is surprising, since my previous wielder wasn't able to do this.' _Riku responded, then tapped her head in the space of Naruto's head she occupied. _'Say, what's a "Winged Kuriboh"?'_ Naruto blinked and scratched his head, wondering that himself.

As he lifted the flaps in the entrance of the ramen stand, Naruto waved to young woman currently flipping some noodles in her fryer... how she did that was beyond him. "Hi Ayame-chan! How're you?" the easily excited blond greeted, waving to the brunette.

Turning to him with a grin, Ayame grinned at her favorite customer. "I'm doing good, Naruto-kun, you?" She then gasped at seeing what was on his forehead, and leaned across the counter to get a better look. "You graduated? Then how come you didn't come here yesterday!" Naruto chuckled nervously as his current ramen chef gave him a disapproving glare.

"Well, uh, I actually, kinda... failed again... but after looking at the results of my tests, Iruka-sensei decided to retest me! Said something about having been able to graduate the first time?" Naruto scratched the back of his head, looking at the ceiling in mock recollection, making sure that the older girl didn't see his eyes. She was rather good at telling when he was lying, which baffled Naruto every now and again.

Naruto turned his head down after his chin was tapped. "What's up with that hilt on your back?" Ayame pointed to where Soul Eater's arrow-like pommel pointed to the sky. Naruto scowled, rubbing a finger in circles on the counter. He began weaving a tale about how it was a secondary chakra focus, which was the reason for the retest. Riku pat Naruto's back, in his head... which confused the boy for a second, but he shrugged then.

"But I passed, so everything's fine. Oh, oh! Doesn't this mean I get that free bowl of ramen?" Naruto looked rather excited at the prospect of free ramen, as he always did, but after a flick on his nose, Ayame chuckled and explained that he would be getting half off for having to retest. Naruto pouted at that.


	6. The First Day, and First Choice

_He slashed through another brainless mook, not bothering to even look at the guy that charged at him with a shout. So many dead in his wake, but there was only one person he was here for… well, one sword and his hostess, really. Couldn't let her get ruined by the bastards here, that's for sure. He was pretty sure they wouldn't know their heads from their knees if someone didn't point it out for them… and he wasn't even sure if he was talking about the right head._

_Nonetheless, he had to make sure that the mother got out of this place relatively unscathed. She had been kidnapped, and probably molested on the way over, after all, so taking her away from this place would do… probably any woman brought here quite a bit of good. But first, he'd have to find one, as apparently, this place he was in now was the barracks, considering more than one armory had been passed along the way to the exit._

"…when did I get so heartless that I could think about finding my way out when there're dozens of dead bodies behind me, I wonder?

* * *

><p>Naruto hummed happily as he walked back to the Academy, his belly full of good ramen. The blond boy wondered to himself if Gai-sensei would let Naruto join his team for the Chunin Exams if one of the original members got injured, but dismissed such thoughts as far in the future and unnecessary for the now.<p>

Plopping back down on his seat next to one broody duckhead, Naruto leaned back and decided to examine his eyelids for a few minutes... which turned into a few seconds when his shoulder was tapped. "You better not be sleeping, Uzumaki, or I will leave you here." a stoic voice said, prompting Naruto's right eye to open. Facing him with arms crossed was one...

"Hyuuga Neji. Why were you the one sent to get me? Couldn't it have been Lee, or Tenten-chan?" Naruto got up from his seat, curbing his usual enthusiasm for everything at the sight of the Branch Member. While everyone else wondered why the heck this guy made Naruto act like not Naruto, except one who was hoping she wasn't spotted and was trying to slip under the table without being seen, the addressed Hyuuga rolled his silver eyes.

"Lee would be trying to make a race around the village with you, and Tenten was late. Again. So I'm stuck with the task of bringing you to see Gai-sensei." Naruto shoved his hands into his pockets at that, and gestured with his chin to the door.

"Let's go, then. We both want to spend little time around each other, and the faster I get to Gai-sensei, the better." Neji couldn't help the smirk that crossed his face at that.

"So you say... Come, we must be going." Neji turned and walked out the door, Naruto two steps behind, leaving a confused classroom, and a sighing in relief heiress.

* * *

><p>"You've gotta be kidding me..."<p>

"Fate is cruel. That is the only explanation for this."

What are Tenten and Neji talking about, you ask? Well, as it turns out, Lee calmed down rather quickly from his usual exuberant self on seeing, and quickly hugging, Naruto, who poked a spot on Lee's back that almost made him burst into those waterfall tears that he and Gai-sensei do when they hug and make that sunset genjutsu behind them. That spot also made Lee act subdued... for him, which is almost normal for other people. Naruto and Lee then began recounting how the last year has been for them both.

"-en, I got this jumpsuit, so Gai-sensei officially took me under his wing as his apprentice! It was quite exhilarating, to say the least. I must thank you once more, Naruto-kun, for helping me become better in taijutsu while we were at the Academy. Were it not for you, I would not have been able to convince the teachers to let me retake the Genin exam as an aspiring taijutsu specialist!" Rock Lee bowed to Naruto for the fifth time in as many minutes. Naruto waved his hand dismissively while shaking his head, chuckling.

"Nah, I'm sure you coulda convinced them on your own, Lee. You had the confidence for it, and more than enough determination and will!" Gai-sensei took what he called the 'Nice Guy Pose', directing it at Lee and Naruto.

"YOSH! Naruto-kun, you most assuredly have stoked Lee's Flames of Youth for days to come! I thank you for this, and extend an invitation to join Lee and I on one of our morning training sessions!" Naruto chuckled nervously at his new Jounin sensei.

"N-no thanks, Gai-sensei. I appreciate the offer, but I'm gonna have to decline. I already have my own training for the mornings, but if you have any, I might join you and Lee for evening training sometime?" Naruto practically flew into a vacuum when Lee, on one side, and Gai, on the other, both screamed out one of their trademarks:

"**YOSH!**" As it was, Naruto's eyes turned into swirls at having two loud voices in both ears. Were Soul Eater's eye visible, it too would've been swirling. As it was, Naruto just fell onto his back after a couple seconds.

"Ah, Naruto-kun! I am so sorry for yelling in your ear, I forgot that you have not been around since I graduated!" Lee knelt down, and tried to pick Naruto up to put him back on his feet, but the boy's stability was wobbly at best, fall down from a light breeze at worst. Tenten shook her head in amusement of the situation, as for once it wasn't her or Neji on the receiving end, and Neji was being Neji(*cougharrogantassholecough*).

Lee chuckled nervously as Naruto shook his head to get rid of the dizziness, then noticed something. "Naruto-kun, what is that sword doing on your back? It looks much bigger than anything else I've seen, and Tenten-san has a lot of weapons." Tenten blushed lightly at the (perceived) praise, and Naruto looked to his right, towards Lee.

"Oh this? I got it on my graduation. Hokage-jiji wanted to give me a present, so I got this from him." The lie passed through Naruto's teeth like ramen noodles would the other way. Not even Neji would be able to see Naruto's middle toe twitch, and Gai was looking the other way, pounding a training log with his bare fists. Lee blinked, and nodded.

"I see. That was very kind of Hokage-sama! Though, I must ask, Naruto-kun, when did you become interested in swordsmanship?" Naruto rubbed his nose, and told Lee the truth about that, considering he'd thought just about any weapon users were pretty cool.

"Except nunchaku and tonfa users, I don't get how those would be any use in a fight." Those were probably the most wrong words to say Naruto could think of. Gai and Tenten proceeded to show Naruto why those two types of weapons were of use in a fight...

**(Vote: Mini-Boss Battle: Gai(Nunchaku) or Tenten(Tonfa)?)**


	7. Learning a Little, right?

_Walking through the empty corridor, he couldn't help thinking that things would've been much better if he'd gone for that clone technique instead… but what was done was done, and there was no changing the past. Instead, he needed to clear a not so bloody way out for his hostess, now that he's rescued her and ****. Hmm, but which way to go first… no darkness sensed down the right, but looking at the end of that hallway, it's already been cleared of living obstacles, so going to the left, with one walking source of darkness, is the way to go._

_At least now he had **** so things were definitely going to look up. A tap on his shoulder from behind, and he turns his head, seeing his hostess's mouth moving, but only white noise is coming from it._

* * *

><p><strong>(Welp, here's what all three of you guys wanted.)<strong>

Naruto looked at the two people that were miffed at his words, and pointed at "Tenten-chan, I'll fight you first!" With that, he brought his hand up to the hilt of Soul Eater, but didn't draw her yet, since he wanted to see how Tenten would open. A little hum in his head showed Riku's approval of that.

Tenten grinned at Naruto, and, after a quick nod from Gai-sensei, launched herself at the blond, tonfas lashing out in quick combos, the occasional kick working in as well. Naruto was surprised he managed to dodge as many of the tonfa strikes as he did, but the kicks weren't very strong, so he didn't bother blocking them. After a few more seconds, Naruto slashed Soul Eater from her sheath, slicing the wooden tonfa down the middle, an action that surprised both combatants, before Naruto capitalized on it with his own kick at Tenten, the brunette jumping back before twirling her tonfa-and-a-half.

"Well, that's surprising. But half a tonfa is still a weapon, so I'm not out yet!" That said, Tenten charged again, but Naruto charged at her in the middle of her little speech, and began slashing at her repeatedly, adding some sloppy stabs in whenever he thought they'd hit, which seemed often, but both were holding back to keep from injuring the other too severely.

Lee punched the air as he watched the two spar. "Yosh! This youthful spar between teammates is sure to help Naruto-kun understand that a fighter need not merely range or blades, but understanding of his weapon as well!" Neji crossed his arms in front of his chest, keeping silent, since he wanted to keep his (undoubtedly sarcastic and spiteful) comments to himself. Gai-sensei's arms were crossed behind his back, analyzing Naruto's sloppy style of swordfighting... but there was definitely something odd to the way his sword was shaped and seemed to blur.

Naruto's grin as the fight went on did not diminish, as he slashed upwards once, and as Tenten dodged to the side, the blond brought his free hand up, pointing at her. "Dark Fire!" Jumping on instinct as he called out, the small white fireball that launched from his hand surprised Tenten, and she went over Naruto's head, bringing her intact, but now scarred, tonfa down at his head, a move that cost her another piece of tonfa.

Neither combatant nor viewer paid mind to the smell of burning wood for very long, but the crashing tree definitely caught all attention. Naruto blinked, and scratched his head, chuckling sheepishly. "Oops."

Tenten gaped at the felled tree, as there was a rather sizable chunk of it that had exploded off it before the two parts just came undone, and Gai-sensei walked over to inspect the stump. Rubbing his chin, bushy eyebrows raised as oddities were seen in the bark. "Naruto-kun, would you mind telling me why it looks like it exploded only from the middle out?"

Naruto shrugged, sheathing Soul Eater as he walked over to his new sensei. "That would be because Dark Fire just works like that. Soul Eater couldn't really explain it to me very well either, since it just knows that the hind part of it blows first." Naruto looked at his new teammates quizzically on seeing their own disbelieving looks. "What?"

"Naruto-kun, I have seen many of Tenten-san's explosives at work, and it never goes behind the explosive tag." Lee wondered why Naruto blinked so much before a tilt of the head. "Yes, that is the truth, Naruto-kun. It was also told to us in class."

Naruto made a sound of acknowledgement before scratching his head. "I musta been kicked out've that class, too." Gai-sensei wondered what Naruto meant by that, but Neji scoffed while Tenten and Lee frowned.

"What class weren't you kicked out of? You're a hopeless dobe, fate has decreed that fro-"

"Oh shut up, Hyuuga. I make my own fate, not some all knowing force crap." Neji growled at Naruto for his statement, and was about to rush him when Gai-sensei spoke up about the match possibly continuing. "How so? Tenten doesn't have working tonfa."

To prove him wrong, and show off that she had improved to her teammates, Tenten pulled out a scroll from the weapons pouch just below the back of her hip, and unrolled it, looking through for the right spot. After a few minutes, Tenten pricked her thumb with the tip of her sandle, and spread the blood across a character, a puff of smoke coming from it. "No working tonfa, huh?" Tenten smirked at Naruto as she rolled up the scroll, and kicked the steel tonfa into her hands.

Naruto chuckled, and drew Soul Eater as he got into a ready stance, curved blade toward the sky, tip pointed at Tenten, cat's eye near Naruto's ear, left foot forward, and left hand cupping air. "Alright, let's get started." A wave of his hand was all Tenten needed to rush Naruto, a little slower because of the weight of the new tonfa, but Naruto still only saw a pink, green and brown blur as he began defending himself. None of his counters sliced through the steel tonfa, but Naruto had a feeling the fight would be over soon anyway, since Tenten added the kicks in again, but Naruto was able to block most of the ones that would've done too much damage.

After a minute or so, Gai-sensei called out for the two to stop, and Tenten's jump away from a counter slash of Naruto's went from tactical retreat to obedience, as she began spinning one tonfa in her hand, the other hanging limply as Naruto sheathed Soul Eater. "Very good, Naruto-kun! I am surprised you managed to last as long as you did against Tenten-kun, as she is my second longest lasting student." Neji looked at Gai-sensei in surprise, as the Hyuuga boy had been rather sure Tenten was the weakest member of their team. "Tenten, good work with your tonfa, I am happy to see one of my cute students diversifying their repertoire of techniques." Tenten grinned at Gai-sensei, crossing her hands, and tonfa, behind her head.

Naruto did some light stretching before looking at Gai-sensei. "So, what now, Gai-sensei? Do we go on a mission to save a princess or king or something?" The blond was bouncing slightly as his hopes soared. They came crashing down rather quickly.

"Naruto-kun, until you have proven you're able to protect yourself, you shall not be saving so much as a cat from a tree!" Lee and Tenten couldn't help chuckles at their sensei's rather serious look for such a silly statement.


	8. Flowers, Weeds, and an Evil Cat

Naruto smiled to himself as he tended to his small garden. It was a little known secret that he was a bit of a botanist, but since he only grew three flowers, that was probably a title he didn't deserve. But Naruto didn't care, not really. They were his flowers, and that's all he needed.

"Oi! Naruto!" a voice called from below the oddly shaped balcony. Naruto got to his feet, and looked down to see Tenten waving to him. The blond waved back. "We've got a mission for you!" Naruto blinked, then began putting his three little plants in a carefully placed hiding box. Borrowing books from Ino on flowers had told him these plants only grew taller when in the sunlight, but when placed in somewhere dark, they would start blooming. Not many plants shared characteristics like that, as far as Naruto knew, but he did know that the flowers and leaves from these could be used as medicine in the field, in small doses. But the flowers hadn't bloomed yet, so Naruto had no petals to test with his teammates.

Shaking his head as he landed next to Tenten, Naruto looked up from his crouched position. "What kind? And who am I replacing?" Tenten sighed and rubbed her nose.

"Lee. Gai-sensei warned him not to push himself too hard, but he went and sprained three muscles… in one move. I don't know how he did that, but Lee did it. So you're taking his place for a couple days." Naruto grinned at finally going on missions, though Lee's…

"Wait, is he in the hospital or something?" Tenten shook her head.

"No, just in his apartment on bed lockdown. I've left a few…"

* * *

><p>Lee groaned as his limbs were once more rebuffed from pulling free of the chains, and it even felt like they were getting tighter in their pull! Why would his teammate make such an un-youthful contraption as this?<p>

* * *

><p>"…measurements to keep him in place." Naruto wondered why he felt like pitying Lee, but shrugged it off. He had a mission!<p>

"When're we going? And where? Are we protecting some prin-" Tenten slapped a hand over Naruto's mouth with practiced ease. The blond kept yammering for a minute until he noticed his voice was muffled, and licked Tenten's hand, which recoiled in shock. "Humph!" Naruto pouted. Tenten shook her head amusedly, wiping her hand on her pants.

"Can't believe I forgot that part... anyway, no, we're not doing any scenarios you're thinking of, Gai-sensei has us doing some D-ranks for a couple days. With you replacing Lee, our available missions have gone down a rank, so be ready for an irritated Neji." Naruto tilted his head as the two began walking.

"You mean he isn't normally irritated with everything?" Tenten chuckled at that.

* * *

><p>"YOSH! My youthful students, and Naruto-kun, it is time we begin our first mission of the day!" Naruto wondered if he'd be able to get through this without being scarred.<p>

* * *

><p>"...and then I said, 'but I don't do fences, I paint them!' Old lady actually stared at me for a couple seconds before she busted up laughing." Tenten laughed a bit herself, as that was a good joke in most circumstances. Neji just stoically pulled weeds along with his teammates. He didn't like pulling weeds, but it was better than THAT mission, bar none. Anything was better than THAT mission.<p>

Anyone who's been a Genin for two weeks can tell exactly what mission Neji was thinking of, except Naruto. He was spared that. Neji was irritated that the dobe did not have to deal with that damnable little demon.

"Ah! My youthful students, and Naruto-kun, I see you are done! Come, we have one last mission for today." Naruto dusted his hands off, and whistled a little tune as he walked with Team Nine towards the village, then out to a forest. He didn't get why Tenten and Neji were starting to shake a bit.

Five hours later, at the Hokage tower, Naruto glared at the cat in Tenten's arms. Neji was not irritated with Naruto anymore, but his hair... his hair!

Tenten was unharmed. She somehow managed to always get out of that mission without a single scratch, as opposed to Lee, who had to get a new jumpsuit on, and Neji, who had to redo his hair every time, and now Naruto, who was also covered in cuts but his appearance was still serviceable in most restaurants.

"Evil cat..." Neji echoed the sentiment in his head, but kept his relative composure. ...his hair!

* * *

><p>Naruto landed on his bed with a plop, and a relieved sigh. Unharmed clothes, his scratches were healed, and his belly full of ramen! Nothing cou-<p>

"Ahem." Oh. Right. He'd forgotten that part of his day.

"Hey Riku! Wassup?" The silver haired shapeshifter crossed her arms under her bust and raised an eyebrow at the blond. "Uh, heh heh heh...? I didn't mean to forget, really, I didn't, but, you also kinda weren't needed today. No combat situations, and we didn't even do any training, so you probably woulda just been bored anyway." This somewhat satisfied her.

"Just so long as you notify me that nothing interesting is happening in the future." Naruto nodded quickly, and the glare and hostile posture relaxed. "My day was good, if a bit boring. Daytime TV still has nothing, even here. You'd think there'd be SOMEthing on, but no! It is maddening." Naruto chuckled as his sword/roommate started ranting, but both eventually went to sleep.

* * *

><p><em>I've been having...<em>


	9. New Team, an Old Friend

Naruto stretched as he walked over to the training area that Gai-sensei's team had. It had been an interesting week as Lee's replacement, but the bushy eyebrowed boy was fully healed now, so Naruto was back to being a third wheel on a very long bike.

"Ah, Naruto-kun, there you are! Come, I have a most youthful plan for you!" Naruto rubbed his eyes and yawned a bit while Gai-sensei spoke. It was way too early for "You shall be transferred to a different team so that you may take part in missions more fully instead of having to wait for one of my cute students to be hurt in an unyouthful accident!" transferring to anoth

Wait what? Transferring? Take part in more missions?

"...why am I only being told of this now? And why not just put me with that new team from the start?" Tenten tried to placate the frustrated Naruto, and started with waving her hands a bit.

"Well, they kinda lost their original third member because he got crippled, so they took a couple months off to help him cope. The guy had to be taken out of the shinobi program entirely because he can't do anything a normal shinobi can with just one arm." Naruto blinked, then scratched his head, giving a light 'oh'. "Yeah... he may have been a Genin longer than us, but he's still a Genin, and Hokage-sama had to let him go." Neji muttered something about fate or destiny, but no one gave him any attention at the moment.

"So, when am I going to check in with my new team?" Gai-sensei nodded, and pointed to his left. Naruto looked that way, and saw two teenaged and one adult women. The teens were about two or three years older than him, as opposed to Gai-sensei's team's one, and the Jounin sensei looked a bit younger than Gai too, though Naruto already thought Gai looked a little older than most people anyways. The three gave Naruto some short waves, and the blond squinted at the only member of the new team wearing glasses, quite sure he should know that face...

"Oh! You're that girl who I met in the library!" All the more experienced ninja gave Naruto odd looks, but the one with glasses seemed to brighten up a bit after a couple seconds. "Shiho-chan, hey, how're you?" The light blonde and very light blond both walked to a shorter distance and started up a conversation like forgotten friends. Everyone was quite confused, so Shiho's other teammate came over to poke Shiho's shoulder.

"Uh, Shiho-chan, who is this?" The one questioned did some fixing up of her rather thick glasses, and began introduction with Naruto to her team.

"R-right, Naruto-kun, this is Amane-san, my-our-teammate, and that's our sensei, Fuuka-sensei." The purple and green haired kunoichi nodded to their new team member in turn, and further introductions were made on the go, so that Team Nine could have their privacy.

* * *

><p>Yamagishi Fuuka gawked at Naruto, who was scratching his head and wondering if his new sensei was going to accidentally eat a fly. Kuzuryu Amane and Hisajima Shiho were just wondering why being a renter of a Kirijo penthouse was a big deal to their sensei.<p>

"So... uh... do we have any missions today, or...what?" Fuuka shook her head at hearing Naruto's question. She could speculate why her old friend let him in later, for now, she had a team to train.

"No missions today, Naruto-san," the two female Genin shivered at that on Naruto's left. He didn't see them do so, "instead, we'll be doing some training. To start..."

Naruto would come to be rather exhausted after everything was done, and lay on the ground, panting. Shiho and Amane were opposite him, in similar positions, while Fuuka huffed and looked them with her fists on her hips. "Well, I see that you two are STILL not used to my easy days. Naruto-san, we'll work you up on how you do later." Naruto's head would've shot up had he the energy to do so... and if the setting sun wouldn't get in his eyes.

"This was an EASY day?! What the heck is HARD? Not even Gai-sensei did anything this demanding!" Fuuka tilted her head, and brought a finger up to her cheek.

"He doesn't? Odd, we worked on the same team, so he should've already introduced you to that. Oh well." The green haired woman shrugged. "Anyway, now that we're done, let's head home, team. We'll go on our first missions with Naruto-san early tomorrow, so get to bed early!" With that cheerful sendoff, Fuuka disappeared in a blur. Shiho and Amane got to their feet after a couple minutes struggling, and saw that Naruto was... doing stretches.

"You two need to stop laying down so long, or else you'll get cramps later on in the week. Definitely be a lot more sore than normal." Amane glared at the blond, while Shiho gave a little laugh.

"Well, Naruto-kun, unlike you, we aren't stamina freaks. Seriously, I thought you'd be down for a few more minutes." Naruto raised an eyebrow at Shiho at that, then shrugged and finished up his stretches.

"Nah, Gai-sensei worked us longer than that on days with no missions, so getting back up wasn't too hard... I am going to be wishing I didn't get Fuuka-sensei after awhile, though, won't I?" Shiho and Amane both laughed at that, and the blond grinned. He liked making people laugh.

* * *

><p>Naruto looked up from his dinner of ramen cups to see Riku holding a hilt leg out towards him. The boy raised an eyebrow at his weaponteacher/friend.

"We're going to go train at night now. It's a lot easier than taking shadows from trees, so for now, you're gonna have dinner a little later than normal. And do everything a little later than normal. So up and at 'em, boyo. We've got ideas to try out." Naruto chuckled, and grinned, setting his empty cup down, and grabbed Riku's leg before the girl disappeared to be replaced by Soul Eater. This would be interesting.

* * *

><p><em>And I wonder...<em>


	10. A Couple Surprise Visits

Naruto stretched as he sat up in his bed. Shaking the sleep out of his eyes and hair, the blond groggily got out of bed, though didn't pay much attention as he walked passed the living room to the restroom, doing his normal morning trip. He waved hi to the two women sitting at his table, rubbing an eye with the other hand. It was as Naruto was drying off his hands that he blinked, thought back to a minute ago, then walked back out of his restroom to see Riku and, uh... he knew her name, he really did... Kioj-no, that wasn't it. Kimim-no. It was... it was...

"Naruto, say good morning to Kirijo-san, she is our landlady. And you need to wake up earlier, it's almost noon." That was her name, Kirijo! ...wait, what'd Riku say about the time? Naruto glanced at a clock on the wall, then ran back to his bedroom to get on a change of clothes before running back out, hurriedly tying his hitai-ate on, but was yanked to a halt by a hand that didn't look that strong. "It's the second Sunday of the month, you have today off."

"He does? Since when?" Naruto also wanted to know how his landlady knew that, but was kind of glad she did. He'd be really embarrassed if he showed up at a team meeting that wasn't there. Adjusting to not being in the Academy was not the fastest of affairs, so he slipped up on when to head off and when not at times.

"It's one of the basic rules of Konoha's shinobi corps. At least, it was the last time I checked a couple years ago. So, the reason I'm here, Uzumaki, is because I am doing something... special for you, as you're the first Genin to ever have one of my penthouses. While you will be paying what a Chunin does, that'll be bimonthly. I'm betting you were a little confused by my not coming around last month?" A nod was her answer. "That would be why. I was giving you a month to get settled in, and from here on, you'll get two types of visits from me. Business, which this is, and is bimonthly, and not, which is when I'll come by to just say hi or see if you're keeping healthy. You're just a few years younger than my youngest Chunin tenant, after all." Naruto blinked at his redheaded landlady, and tilted his head.

"Were you a kunoichi before? Because you give off the same air as Iruka-sensei when he's teaching something not history." Mitsuru blinked back, and chuckled, before nodding.

"I was. Umino and I were on the same team before he was promoted and I had to leave the service." Riku perked up at hearing this, and glanced at Mitsuru then Naruto, and back to Mitsuru but the blond's mouth was already opening.

"Ohhhhh. Who was your Jonin sensei?" Naruto had his head patted for that.

"Maybe next time I'm here. So then, Riku-san already told me you'd been keeping the rent in the basket, so I helped myself. For now, good day." With that, Naruto and Riku waved bye to Mitsuru as she left. The silverette turned to Naruto, and hummed.

"I'd say you missed a golden opportunity, but, we don't know her well enough yet. And she probably had different circumstances than you." Naruto chuckled at that, and nodded.

"Hey, I might not be that smart, but I do know SOME things, Riku." The weapon nodded, then hummed in thought.

"So, since you have the day off, what-"

"Shopping." A blink.

"Huh?" Naruto shrugged, and turned to the kitchen to start making breakfast.

"We're low on food. And it isn't like it'll just appear without us having to do anything." Naruto looked around, apparently waiting for something... "Huh. That normally works. Oh well." Riku chuckled a bit before she started heading to the door. On opening it, she blinked.

"Hi there, Yamagishi." The teal haired woman nodded to her student's weapon/roommate before turning her to attention to said student, lowering her unused knocking hand.

"How're you, Naruto-kun?" The blond gave a 'so-so' reaction before his newest sensei held up a little bag. "I was just stopping by to have some lunch with a friend, but she said she already had arrangements, but you were awake, so I thought I'd see if you minded me coming over." Naruto grinned to himself, and waved Fuuka in.

"No, no, come in, please. I was just about to use the last of my food to make breakfast before heading out. Whatcha got?" Fuuka walked to the kitchen while he talked, Riku closing the door, and the Jounin pulled out some breakfast and lunch foods. "Hm... it ain't bacon, but it has been awhile since I made an omelet. Yeah, this'll do."

* * *

><p>"...Naruto-kun, can we share recipes sometime? This is amazing!"<p>

"Seriously. This is better than what I remember having in a LOOOOONG time!"

"Aw, stop that, I'm not that good." Anyone that knows Naruto outside his home would be surprised to find that when it comes to certain dishes, he was rather good at them. As Fuuka and Riku learned now. The blond would be rubbing the back of his head were he not eating. After a bit of more praise, the three got onto the topic that Naruto had been restraining himself from.

"So, Fuuka-sensei, when're we gonna go on a C-Ranked mission?" The teal haired woman rubbed her chin, chewing a bit of omelet. The silver haired teen/weapon was almost going to poke the adult at the table before the questioned spoke up.

"Probably next month, actually. You've made some good progress, and I think you've got the requisite number of D-Ranks for you to join us for some C-Ranks. Three, at the least. We'll see how the winds blow later." The blond boy pumped a fist, grinning as his two lunch partners laughed at his reaction.


	11. What is this?

_I've been having..._

Falling... falling, into darkness...

_These weird dreams, lately..._

Coming up, a light, sunlight, was seen. It was just about blinding, and the water dripping from his hair didn't help at all to see better. But, wait, there wasn't any water back there, or at that... oh, right, the docks around

_And I wonder..._

The water came up again, knocking vision out again, but water rushed on passed, leaving lots of bubbles along the way. Air didn't seem to be a problem, but

_Are any of these for real..._

Stumbling onto the beach, he shook his head, and looked up, then grinned back at the blonde and brunette. He liked their new looks, and while he'd hoped they could have stayed a little closer to not being so revealing in one case, or concealing in the other, he wouldn't complain. That was what they felt like wearing and he didn't really have a say. He had bee

_...or not?_

Music. That was the first thing he really heard, and the singer was rather familiar, but- he recoiled a bit, bringing a hand up to block out the sudden flood lights.

_~You're giiiiving meeeee~_

_"What?"_

A vague outline could be seen silhouetted against the light, and while the voice was familiar, that didn't mean he could place it outright.

_~Too maaaany things... lately...~_

_"No, it isn't..."_

Flashes of things he'd done, he'd do, he'd seen, he'd see, but, they were disjointed, not all cohesive, not everything was legible...

_~You're aaaaall I neeeeeed, ooooh oh...~_

_"But I-"_

_~You smiiiled at me... and said(and said)~_

A flash of what he'd do, say, hear, see, touch

_~Don't get me wrong_

"I love you"

_but does that mean I have to meet, your faaatherrr?~_

"-when we're older, you'll understand what I meant"

_~When I said no, I don't think life is quiiite that siiimpLE!~_

Walking away, he couldn't help but wondered what was being said to his back

"Please

_~oh baby~_

don't go!"

Simple and clean, that was how it was supposed to be, not something like this.

_~the way that you're making me feeel tonight~_

"-hard for me, too. I don't want to let you go"

_~Hooold me~_

"-whatever lies beyond that sun"

_~Is a little later ooon~_

He'd walk, regardless of what they gave as warnings

_~The future doesn't scare me at aaaaoohhhh-aalll,_

_Nothiiing's like before!~_

"-ease, just, hold me..."

_~Whatever lies beyond this moooorning~_

"-ust, a little later on"

_~Regardless, of warnings, the future doesn't scare me at aaaaaohhh-aaaall_

_Nothing's like before!~_

_"Oh. That's what she meant..."_

Opening his eyes, he looked around. Blackness everywhere below his feet, but, turning around, he saw that he was standing on the edge of a platform that looked like it was made of stained glass. On it was a picture of a woman with straight, light blonde hair, wearing a plain pink kimono and sandals. Even so, she had a look that Naruto would definitely describe as eye catching. Why she caught his attention so was unknown to him, since he hadn't seen her at all in his life. With her back to him, there wasn't a way for Naruto to say otherwise.

Moving closer to the center, Naruto looked around. This place was so bizarre... but at the same time, so familiar, like he'd seen this place so many times it almost hurt to see the blonde's back to him. Placing a hand on his chest, Naruto closed his eyes as he stopped on the middle of the woman's bow, or where such a thing would be if her hair were shorter and not blocking the area. A voice ringing out made the boy tense.

"Welcome back. It has been so long, ****. What can I do for you this time? After all, it isn't like you managed to find me or her the last six times you came to me. Why should this be any different?"

"No..." Clencing a fist against his chest, Naruto looked up to glare into the black. "You're wrong. I will find you this time. There won't be any mistakes. I won't stop until I find you and her. This time, that's a promise I'm going to keep." The words just spilled from his mouth, but he felt like they were right. He'd keep this promise and find... whoever he should be looking for. He wouldn't fail again.

"Pretty words. But, can you back them up? Are you able to fight against the tides that will be rising to stop you? Against those with plans for halting all that you've achieved and reversing it? Show me, *****, what it is that allows you to keep going. Show me you have what it takes to push back!"

While the feminine voice was vaguely familiar, Naruto didn't have much time to ponder on it as he saw white portals lined with thorny vines appear. Out of those rose... Dusks. The information appeared in his head even though he didn't remember how first got it, but the ways to fight them and how to confuse were still in his head all the same.

Calling his sword to his hand, Naruto looked around at the Dusks as five more joined the three that first showed up. This many would be an easy time. His Other had dealt with these and came out with barely a sweat. ...Other?

Dodging a leg whip out of instinct, Naruto decided to focus on the matter at hand and attacked the open Dusk, his sword a silver streak through it as a laceration appeared. Turning, he blocked a headbutt and kicked the Nobody away. Looking to two that were just sauntering over, he ran at them, and slid around, confusing the two with his 'sudden disappearance'. They were confused no longer as their heads were cut from their shoulders.

Jumping into the air, he dodged as another Dusk slithered through the space between the white and black fireworks show that was a dead Nobody, and cut the offending thing in half length wise on landing. Striking out this way and that, Naruto heard some more Nobodies come out of the floor, so he moved to parry whatever was coming at his back, but found himself being swung a bit, and then flung at an invisible wall. Colliding back first, Naruto slid down, groaning a bit.

Looking up, he saw that it was a beige and pink Nobody, a Dancer, that threw him. There were three in total, bringing the Nobody numbers up to seven, with four Dusks remaining. Getting to his feet, the young Genin readied his sword again, and got a good look at it.

He was confused for a second since it wasn't Soul Eater, it was a more normal looking sword made of steel, but it had two edges and two sharp turns at the top instead of curving. The guard was a dragon chasing its tail, and the leather wrapped hilt was a little thicker than usual, but it was still a comfortable hold. It seemed to be long enough for half of his other hand to hold the hilt and make swings a little stronger. However, the pommel was an oddity as well, since it had a red eye that looked like a copy of Soul Eater's hilt eye.

An attack from a Dusk brought Naruto out of his thoughts as he moved on instinct, deflecting the arm swipe with the flat of his sword before slashing out. The basic Nobody's head went flying for a couple inches before it and the rest of the body dispersed. While the rest of the Dusks would be just as easy to dispatch on their own, the additions in Dancers would make this a very hard fight. Not getting caught by their auras was hard enough when he only had to focus on them... wait...

Naruto jumped and slashed out, an arc of green fire lashing from the tip of his silver blade. The Dancer caught in the arc was pushed back, burnt and no longer aiming to throw him. Landing, the blond lashed out with a circular slash, more green fire coming out of the sword as he stood. The Dusks were done for, leaving only the pink/beige Nobodies to deal with. Their number had been cut down to two, so Naruto thought he could afford to focus on one for now. He went for the one that looked to be closer to full health.

After another few throws and slashes, Naruto stood alone, panting, his sword arm sore from the differently weighted weapon in his hand. This was not how he'd thought a nap after lunch would've gone, at all.


	12. Why isn't there blood?

**Please note, the Russian was taken from Google Translate. If anyone can tell me a better version and send me that, that would be appreciated.**

* * *

><p>Looking around at the scenery, Naruto sighed a bit. There weren't any doors or paths to take, so he wasn't quite sure what to do. Until the soft sounds started ringing out behind him. Turning, the blond saw that stained glass stairs appeared, vaguely connected to each other by strands of greenish energy that didn't look like too far from those medical jutsu Fuuka-sensei used. Glancing at the blonde's back one more time, the blond turned to start up the stairs.<p>

It didn't take long for him to get those glass steps behind him, so Naruto looked around the new platform he was on. The woman on it was a redhead, also with her back to him, but at least there was more to her than just a kimono. The short red hair ended in spikes, and it looked like she was holding a flute to her lips, and there was a hat of some odd design resting at her feet, along with an outfit that looked like a mix of beige and black with a really thick purple rope laying next to it.

On closer inspection, Naruto found the woman was trying to break the flute, not play it, given how she was holding both ends. He wondered why she would be doing that, but shrugged it off as something he'd learn sooner or later. At any rate, Naruto looked around for what he could use as an exit, and just saw more nothi-blackness. There were other things out there, he could faintly feel them now, but they were too far for Naruto to see them. Nothingness didn't have anything in it, that would just be silly.

A young silver haired man sneezed into his elbow, his topknot wearing friend blessing him before the two resumed their book studies.

Flipping the odd sword in his hand a couple times, Naruto walked to the center of the woman's outfit again, and noticed that he was walking into a pillar of light. Looking behind himself, Naruto saw that his shadow was rising from the platform and taking a not very 'him' appearance. A giant nine tailed fox made of black with glowing yellow eyes wasn't all that humanoid, was it? ...wait, no, it wasn't just black that made up the fox's body, it was a swirling Darkness, sort of like what Riku used to switch into Soul Eater straightaway, but the feelings the two gave off were far from similar. His partner/weapon was simply neutral, and a little tingly, given the bit of lightning that went through the cloudy blackness, but this thing was evil. No, it was Evil. There was no getting around it, this black fox was destruction incarnate and wouldn't stop until it was sated with the destruction of the whole world. Maybe even beyond that, too.

Getting into a combat stance, Naruto watched the black fox, and it did the same to him, tails swaying gently in an unfelt breeze. The blond wasn't sure where to attack first, since the animal didn't strike him as something that would fall like those Dusks did, not anything like them, really. And it had nine more methods of attack, if not more, considering those tails. Fourteen plus attacks was not something Naruto could readily defend against, though more than two claws at once was fairly inside the realm of possibility... he hoped.

Retreating a few steps, Naruto kept his guard up. There was no telling what this fox of Darkness would do, so he figured a bit of a waiting game would be good for now. And this would likely be what kept the blond from being pulped, as he managed to dodge over and between a couple claw swipes and tail slams with that mindset. A few slashes with his sword showed that this enemy wouldn't be easily injured, as the leaking injuries lasted for little more than three seconds. _"...and did those limbs stretch? Dammit, gotta stay on my toes."_

"**да**..." Naruto jolted a bit, wondering just what that was, before the muzzle on the fox like thing widened, showing some rather contrastingly bright teeth. "**Это то, что я искал. Шанс получить бесплатно!**"* It roared as he jumped back, avoiding some pillars of fire as they emerged from the glass. Oddly, not a single part was burnt, though the same couldn't be said for Naruto's clothes.

"Gah, hot, hot, hot hot hot!" the blond exclaimed as he shook his arm out, trying to make the fire disappear. It worked better than he'd thought it would, though it still took too long for him. Looking to the amused black fox thing, Naruto grit his teeth as he got into his battle stance, ready for the fire pillar attack to come out again.

The boy charged at the monster, one of the tenets of winning fights rang out in his side.

"Don't let your opponents dictate your rhythm, it will let them dominate you in the field."

Threading the limbs and appendages as he looked for an opening, Naruto tightened his grip on the hilt, and resumed his charge as he saw where to go. The tails tried to squash him, but he moved through the smallest openings in their formation, and managed to not get burnt from the pillars of fire as he jumped, and slashed down with a battle cry...


	13. Bad Wakeups and Knocked Doors

Shooting up from his pillow, Naruto panted a bit, face cold from sweat as he looked around quickly. No, he wasn't being swallowed by a giant fox made of black and hate and shadows. Okay. Everything was okay. He didn't have any bite marks, or slash marks, or... anything he didn't before going to sleep. _"Weirdest. Dream. Ever."_ he decided.

And that was before seeing some really weird things in his view for a few blinks before they disappeared. Why was there... whatever. He had better and more present things to worry about than a brown haired kid in the corner of his vision. Like what to do now that night had fallen and he wasn't hungry... oh, Riku did say that she had a new move to teach him. Hopefully it would do something to that red dot on his navel he saw when he used a mixture of Darkness and chakra in the restroom.

_"...re-note to self: do NOT do that again. Eyes can only take so much stress."_

With that filed away, and his vision no longer blurry as it was... only two hours? Huh. Quickest nap yet. Well, anyway, Naruto hopped out of his bed and walked over to the restroom, whistling a tune as he waved hi to Riku, who was sitting on the couch, reading an orange book.

"...I think Riku should have read this. He would not have been such a stick in the mud. Maybe." It was quite interesting how one man could come up with so many ways to describe a few parts of the female anatomy. So engrossed was she that Riku didn't hear the knocking at the door. Or the pounding on the door.

She definitely heard the kicking in of the door, though, and jumped a bit, fumbling the book a couple times before holding it to her chest and looking to see some woman with purple hair in a pineapple ponytail... thing. Her trench coat definitely should have showed more than just outlines of her torso through the mesh fishnet. "Yo!" For having kicked in the door, the brown eyed woman was entirely too cheerful. And it looked genuine, too.

"...can I help you?"

"Yeah. Where's blondie? He's late on the bills, and Kirijo-ojou-chan is out, so I'm the tax collector right now." That explained the reason for kicking the door so hard.

"...so why kick the door in at all? You could have said something through it." Then again, considering it took a door flying a few meters to get Riku out of her reading, maybe she wouldn't have heard that, too...

"Eh, I was chewin' dango. You wanna hear gibberish instead of actual words?" So saying, the woman brought up a dango skewer, one last ball left on the wooden needle before she bit it. "Sho, where ish blondie?"

"Dammit, Yuugao-chan, why are you kicking in my doors agai-wait, you're not Yuugao-chan. Who are you?" The dango chewer looked surprised at the boy's words... or perhaps that he walked out with just a towel to keep his modesty intact. Naruto did have a body that most would associate with an older teen, in terms of packed up muscles. He certainly looked the part of stunted thirteen year old otherwise, being only a little taller than the smallest former classmate he had.

"How do you know Yuugao? And so familiar... maybe I should ask Hayate about this..." The woman looked a little predatory at this.

"She was my last ANBU guard when I started the Academy... and the nicest. She actually talked with me." That threw her for a loop. The Jinchuuriki remembered his ANBU detail? Or one of them at least... who apparently kicked in his door a few times. That rated some investigation, and interrogation. Luckily, the next gathering would be in two days. Drunk Yuugao was loose lipped Yuugao!

...if you managed to get her to START drinking, anyway. Woman was more of a steel trap than Kurenai's... eh, well, she had been opening up to Asuma lately... maybe that meant Yuugao would be more openminded? (As if!)

"Well, gaki, I'M here to get the bills you're late on. An-oh. Cool." Anko took the stack of ryo held out. Counting it by flipping through, a skill that took far longer than it should have to acquire, the Tokubetsu Jonin nodded after a minute. "Alright, that's everything in order. Later!" With that, she turned and headed out.

"...dammit, now I need to save up for new hinges."

"Isn't that part of the wall falling off, too?"

"GODSDAMMIT."

-  
>Two days later<br>-

"And then she broke down my door, had me give her the late bills, and now I'm here!" Slurping was heard next as Naruto resumed inhaling the ramen in front of him, Iruka-sensei on the stool next to him. The blond had been doing double the usual amount of missions the passed couple days, so his former teacher decided to treat him for the perceived diligence.

"Ooooiii! Naruto-san! Fuuka-sensei has a mission for us!" The said blond looked behind him to see Amane standing next to a waving Shiho, the two girls a bit away.

"Ah, sorry Iruka-sensei, but I've gotta get going. Seeya later!" The brown haired man shook his head amusedly as he returned to his own ramen, and blinked at seeing Naruto's empty bowl. There wasn't even broth left, how did he... whatever. That was one of those things Naruto just did, you don't question how he eats and drinks ramen so fast.


	14. It Begins, again

Naruto blinked some. He hadn't expected that to be their mission. "Sasuke-teme can't finish a mission on his own? ...hells yeah! This is just the sort of thing I need to hold over his hea-ow!" The blond pouted at the woman that knocked his noggin. There was no reason to hit that hard.

Fuuka kept her eyes on the Third Hokage as he gave the details on why Kakashi's team needed backup in the middle of a mission now ranked B. Momochi's survival was just speculation right now. While she felt her team would have done with some more practice, this would be a good practice for next year. However... "Why a team of Genin, Hokage-sama? Surely we have a Chuunin or two that would be happy to take this mission. B-ranks are less common than Cs, after all."

It was one of those odd things with mission rankings. D and C-ranked missions were about as plentiful as you could get, being in and around the village, and sometimes outside the country, but only ever lasted a month at the longest. B-rankings meant the chance of enemy Chuunin level opponents, at best, but also longer than a month, at least. The A-ranks were where the adventurous Jonin spent their time, really, testing their skills on jobs that had small, but still very much there, chances of dying in the line of fire, and possibly spanning a couple days to a year. She hadn't been on any S-ranks, those were all but reserved by ANBU, but considering the various divisions of the Assassin Corps had their own bar close to the T&I HQ...

Hiruzen took a couple puffs of his pipe before pulling it away. "An excellent question, Fuuka-kun. While there are Chuunin who qualify, aside from defending the bridge, I need you and your team to scout the town. Kakashi-kun's reported he hasn't done any such thing besides a couple of his Genin accompanying the client's daughter to the market and back, and there might be things going on that your more diverse team will be able to handle compared to Kakashi-kun's assault squad." Potential meant nothing if it was used, after all, and the Haruno girl had yet to visit the hospital for any lessons. Though, the actual reason that had been unsaid but seen by the teal haired woman was that the Chuunin who were capable were also busy in some way or another. Probably the only ones left in town right now were the ones who taught at the Academy, which happened about once a month.

This was why the Third Hokage felt there were at least some restrictions that should have stayed. A minimum grade in the practicals would have been best, since then they could tell who was actually focused on Being a ninja, instead of just looking for a job at an early age that was quite romanticized, which would make putting them into specific niches easier. Why, in his day... wait, he almost missed that question.

"No, Amane-kun, I have great confidence you and your team can handle this mission appropriately. And the three members of Team Seven are still hearty, even if their Jonin sensei is regaining his chakra usage. It should take you only a few days to get there, Fuuka-kun. Safe journey." The old Professor smiled as Naruto jogged around to give him a hug before heading out. Even if it was only a couple weeks, he would miss the boy.

* * *

><p>Naruto grinned as he ran along the road out of Konoha. Even if he had done it a few times already, C-ranks were still chances to see new places. He'd only done the same sort of mission twice, but those courier missions had still gone to entirely different towns. He wanted to see Tanzaku Gai again some time soon, that castle looked cool!<p>

The trek to Nami no Kuni would take a while, even without a client to protect, but who knew what Haruno's team would get up to, or caught up in, during that time? The fake hunter nin, a death-ish state, and a tyrannical businessman... wow. That sounds like a lot could go VERY wrong on this mission in just two and a half days. The letter had said Hatake had only been resting for a day, which meant that Zabuza guy had about six days left. So, by his calculations, once they got to the client's home, they would have... eh, two, three hours of rest at best before Fuuka-sensei started working them into the ground again. Not much different from other missions of the sort, except a rank up in the record.

Riku's voice was heard grunting a bit in his head, seeing as her scabbard was bouncing a bit on his back every few minutes. Some jumps to branches were harder than others. _'Can you go a little slower, Naruto? I feel like I'm gonna throw up...'_

The blond chuckled a bit, and grinned wider. _"No way, Riku, I'd get left behind for sure! And besides, can't you walk around in my head while I'm awake now?" _It had been a new development just a few days ago, so the silverette/sword not remembering when she had so many schedules and kenjutsu techniques on the mind wasn't surprising. Hearing a bit of grumbling, the Soul Eater on his back got a little lighter, something he still needed to get used to himself, while Riku herself went looking through the apparently sewer that was Naruto's mind. Riku was perplexed as to why it would be such a shape, but Naruto had a few ideas she hadn't, and wouldn't if he could help it, heard.

Turning his attention back to the trees and his team in the real world, Naruto started up a conversation with his teammates about what to do when they got to Nami no Kuni. Fuuka-sensei would pitch in a few words here or there when they said something completely wrong, so they didn't aim anything towards her just yet.


	15. A Turn For

Looking over the shoreline, Amane rubbed her chin. "There isn't much we can do to get across without a boat. It's way too long from here to the island Nami no Kuni is, isn't it, Fuuka-sensei?" The teal haired woman nodded, and crossed her arms under her bust.

"For you three, yes. I'd be able to make it over once, but not while carrying any of you... actually, Naruto-kun, you have enough chakra to make it across, don't you? I know you've made progress with keeping leaves on your elbows, let alone water walking." The blond didn't answer for a couple seconds, trying to keep a leaf on his nose without smelling it.

"...huh? Oh, yeah. I've been doing better, Fuuka-sensei, but I don't think I can carry them both across either." The Jonin chuckled a bit, and clarified that Naruto would only have to carry one of them. "Oh, I can do that, easily. Just one of you two cli-oof!" Shiho had jumped on to his back quickly, almost sending Naruto to the ground, and water.

"Mush!"

"...pushy, pushy. Ah! Hey, watch the hair!"

Fuuka shook her head some as she crouched for Amane to climb onto her back. "Don't go too quickly now, you'll want to be able to guard the house when we get there." The two yellow haired Genin gave affirmatives, one a little more grumbly considering his hair was being used as a set of reins.

* * *

><p>Naruto whistled at the damage done to the path. That was a lot of wet ground, and a couple knocked over trees too, it looked. Shiho adjusted her glasses some, wondering what kind of jutsu did that. "Well, from the looks of it, a very strong Water Bullet, at the least. But that sounds a bit too chakra intensive for even Momochi Zabuza, so maybe a Great Waterfall? Hm... either way, we still have to keep moving. In the trees."<p>

The three Genin followed after their Jonin sensei. However, Naruto stopped suddenly, letting out a mixed hiss and grunt of pain, tumbling to the ground. Fuuka looked to see what had happened, and cursed. "Shiho, Amane, get Naruto out of here! I'll deal with-" She whipped out a kunai to deflect the projectiles which had made Naruto crumple. Senbon, huh. A large enough spray wouldn't need much accuracy, and it seemed that was just what happened to Naruto and... Soul Eater. The green eye was closed, likely in pain, with a needle embedded between the crack.

Riku flashed into existence, and immediately started crying out in pain, clutching at her eye which had a senbon stuck almost halfway in. The silver haired girl fell onto her back, rolling a bit in pain while Naruto tried to get up. "Ri-Riku..." Fuuka jumped to see if she could find the thrower quickly. Tracking may not have been her strong suit, but she was a Jonin. Just Taijutsu and Ninjutsu didn't get her that far on their own.

Shiho looked sickly at seeing the blood coming from behind Riku's hands, while Amane was frozen in shock. Naruto moved a bit closer to his partner, but not very far. One of the senbon had managed to hit a major artery, while two more got in his spine. He could barely move his arms, and his legs were a lost cost. "Riku..."

* * *

><p><span>"Guh, no, not what I wanted... well, better hit the save file. At least I've gotten used to this now."<span>

* * *

><p>Naruto grinned as he ran along the road outside of Konoha...<p> 


	16. The Masked One

Naruto felt his ear twitch as he landed on a branch, and turned quickly to deflect some throwing needles with his forearm. Hooray mesh underarmor! "Ahright, show yourself!"

Fuuka and the girls landed next to Naruto, Amane trying to look through the foliage while Shiho checked his sleeve. Fuuka looked around seemingly impassively, but she saw a lot more than Amane could hope to at this stage in her development. Whoever this mystery attacker was, they were either good or gone. Given how no new attacks were coming so far, the Jonin didn't rule out either yet. Naruto saw as far and deeply into the foliage as his teammate, but he saw something very odd when he applied the power of Darkness to his eyes for a few seconds.

Riku had told him doing so would be a little disorienting the first dozen or so times, and she'd been right. As it was, Naruto still felt a little dizzy from the colors in the area just draining in the blink of an eye, turning black and white and grey... except for that shining spot of light. How the heck could an Assassin Corps impostor have such a bright heart? It didn't make any sense. Still, that was what he saw, so Naruto whipped a kunai at the area, startling his teammates while Fuuka watched the knife whistle through the air. It disappearing into the foliage, and then being thrown back was all the answer the Jonin needed to send it back again, this time following it physically, jumping from tree branches.

Naruto looked to Shiho as Amane jumped after their teacher. The glasses wearing blonde gave a positive diagnosis, with there being no need to repair the sleeve or bandage the skin underneath. "Let's go help Sensei and Amane-chan!" The two Genin jumped after their comrades and the sound of fighting. Fuuka had caught up with the false Oinin it seemed. Was Amane also fighting?

Finding their other teammate standing on a branch was the answer to that, and Fuuka was giving the false Hunter as good as she got. "Whoa... I didn't think Fuuka-sensei could move so fast!"

Naruto nodded with Shiho's statement, watching the teal haired Jonin blur around the small clearing. The black haired Oinin was either almost as or a little bit faster than Fuuka-sensei, it was hard to tell with how quickly their exchanges happened. He needed to get to that kind of skill soon, if he wanted to make it on his own one day.

_"Thankfully, you still have a good few months before that's something to really worry about."_ Naruto mentally nodded to Riku's words. He would train almost every day so he could get to a level strong enough to support himself and her outside Konoha. ...when they got back to Konoha. For now, how to help Fuuka-sensei? Oh!

"Fuuka-sensei, gimme a shot at him!" Naruto hopped down from the tree, and started running from tree to tree so as to not be in the line of fire of either of them. He unsheathed Soul Eater and started pushing his chakra into the sword of Darkness. Riku hadn't taught him how to do that neat lightning trick yet, so he just went straight into Aura, but...

Fuuka, on seeing Naruto's plan with the glowing sword, wondered how many trees would go down before kicking the fake Assassin Corps member away harshly, giving her the space needed to move away from Naruto's minimum radius, which would still take him through several trees. The mask wearing nin was able to make the move from tree with his back to ground smoothly, for someone that was likely aching something fierce. That kimono was thick enough to block out the bark's impact, though, even if the kick had broken a couple ribs, at least. That was without taking into account the other attacks that landed.

Jumping out from the tree line, Naruto brought Soul Eater up near his head so the cat-like eye was level with his cheek, grinning a little more ferally than most would think him capable of. "Eat this!" And then he stabbed forward, momentum and Darkness propelling him into a small portal. Which then made an exit on the bun wearer's side, which they barely managed to avoid, though one long bang lost a chunk of hair at the end. Then Naruto appeared on another side of his target, still in the same pose but also still moving at speeds most Jonin could only keep up with on their best days. Whoever this person was, they used only the smallest amount of movements needed to dodge once they'd regained stable footing, but after one shave too many got too close, jumping around became the dodging game. It helped somewhat, but given they were almost too fast for Naruto to keep up with while using Dark Aura, the blond didn't appear or strike from the same spot or angle twice.

After a solid ten seconds of this, the thief from the Bloody Mist almost resorted to their trump in order to get away, but Naruto appeared back where he'd started the whole barrage, his body covered in a white light that did not bode well to his target. "Heal this..." He didn't know why, but saying it like that, like Sasuke would've, felt... kind of cool. The barrage of lightning spikes that uprooted a few trees(and most stumps) around him didn't hurt him either. The one who should've been hurt by it though...

"Wow, Naruto-kun, I didn't think you'd do that to him!" Shiho voiced her and Amane's thoughts a little louder than intended once they got back to their male teammate. If it weren't for the fact Naruto kept Soul Eater out of (its? her?) sheath, and Fuuka-sensei looked about ready to draw a kunai or two, she would've fangirled a bit more. Amane crushed the rest of those thoughts immediately.

"A shame you didn't actually defeat whoever that was." Naruto nodded in agreement. Such a source of light left trails no matter what they did, and Naruto didn't need to focus more than a passing glance's worth of Darkness to see it having fled the area in a southerly direction. Nicked a good few times, and missing some hair, on top of dealing with Fuuka-sensei's numerous powerful hits, meant whoever they were up against had a lackey with some pain tolerance, especially given they hadn't heard a single utterance of the slightest noise from the Hunter's masked mouth the entire time, even against Fuuka. It was quite annoying.

Fuuka looked to her students. "Come on, we should get to Kakashi and his team. They'll probably have some information on this guy we missed."


	17. A Bit of Relaxation

Amane sighed a bit as she leaned against a tree, feet in the water. It had been awhile since she and Shiho had sparred on top of it, so the workout had done her good. And while it wasn't a running river, it was still somehow producing waves, so they got their usual exercise on control too. Naruto still had trouble maintaining his balance on waves, let alone when fighting, but he was making progress.

Shiho was too busy laughing at her male teammate's progress making to join the Kuzuryu in relaxing right now. The other blond was sputtering as he tried to get out of water that was not waist deep, and had fish that were curious instead of frightened. Well, before he'd jumped into the air and then fell into the lake. Fuuka-sensei was watching Naruto from a few meters ahead of him, sighing a bit. The Jinchuuriki was making as much progress as he had with tree walking, always too little chakra being used constructively. With the amount he was purported to have, she thought he'd have blown himself away from the various surfaces they'd used, but, no. It was odd, but that was what these exercises were for.

From a different part of the shoreline, Haruno Sakura watched with envy as Naruto was at least LEARNING something from his sensei. Kakashi-sensei had only just taught them tree walking, and just by giving a short demonstration and telling what her two teammates did wrong before making her run up and down the bark a lot. Since the pink haired girl felt she could do five laps without gasping now, she'd felt fairly accomplished at what she had done. And then the top kunoichi in her class saw this. Earlier, the two older girls had been sparring on top of the river, and Naruto was wobbling a lot. Now, after barely half a day, he was able to stand almost perfectly fine. Except for the occasional big wave or fish, but still. Why couldn't Kakashi-sensei do anything like that with her team?

Back in the house of his client, the said Jonin was waiting for his less Uchiha male student, one Tobio, to stop looking so intently at him from across the table. "Aren't you going to eat?"

The brunette boy shook his head, watching the man. "Not until you do, sensei." He had to take that mask off at some point. Only wa-when did that plate get empty?

Kakashi stood up, and thanked Tsunami for the meal before using his crutch to head back upstairs to rest some more. Chakra exhaustion was a lot more serious than people thought when you were using foreign objects in your body, even if they'd been there for a little over fourteen years.

Sasuke was trying to not set the forest on fire, meanwhile. He'd blown apart a good portion of most of the trunks around him, and he'd used up so much chakra doing it, the Uchiha was now slipping from the base of the tree in front of him. Listening to the dobe, the DOBE!, splashing around and walking on the lake was not helping his current attitude. What the hell was wrong with him? Sakura getting it first, okay, sure, she was explained by Kakashi to have very small chakra reserves. Tobio was just lazy, which was why the boy wasn't out with him. But him, Uchiha Sasuke, the Rookie of the Year, unable to climb trees with his feet? That was just too much. Turning from the trees, the boy with the duck-like hair(though he would deny that to anyone who said so) walked to go demand the dobe's sensei teach him. He would be why was the ground coming up like that?

Sakura turned on hearing the solid impact of something on the ground, and screeched at the sight before her. Fuuka didn't slip down at all because she was so used to her chakra, while Naruto went under immediately. Team Nine went to investigate, their male member swimming to give his legs a bit of perceived rest. The pink haired girl had collapsed as well by the time they got to her, though since the Uchiha was face down on the ground, no one was truly surprised by her reaction. While Naruto tried to figure out a way to wake her up without splashing her, Riku cursing him out in his head for getting her so wet, the other members of Team Nine just laughed a bit at the situation.

* * *

><p>Naruto yawned as he woke up, sitting up and rubbing the sleep from his eyes. Now, what to-"Hey! Get your grubby mitt away from that!" Uchiha Sasuke, meet Uzumaki Naruto's Bare Foot. The sword he was about to grip was actually still asleep, so nothing would have happened to Sasuke. For a few seconds. "The hell do you think you were going to do, run off with Soul Eater?! Like hell!"<p>

Sasuke glared at Naruto, rubbing his cheek even as his back ached from landing on it. "Well, why should you have a sword so ornate? It barely fits any of your outfits, forget the fact it would do much better in my hands! I-"

"Know jack shit about how to wield swords!"

"At least I didn't have to get a hand-me-down team!"

"A hand-me-down team which is way better than your rookies! They'd be able to whoop your ass in a minute! Ten seconds for Fuuka-sensei!"

"NARUTO-BAKA! SHUT UP!" The boys jumped a bit when Sakura slammed the door open, glaring at the blond for waking her from her beauty sleep so rudely.

"_HARUNO! SHUT UP!_" The other inhabitants of the house, permanent and otherwise, were more cross with her being much louder. Only three voices sounded out, though, the home's owners being too polite, squeaky voiced, or hung over to yell, and the Jounin being used to loud things going on around them too much to wake at a simple screech. The other Genin in the house were not in such situations, though. The pink haired Genin flinched a bit, then returned to glaring at Naruto, who was now clutching Soul Eater protectively to his chest, Sasuke brooding in a corner.


End file.
